Teal Bunbury celebrates his eighth goal of the season on Saturday night. (Photo Credit: Kari Heistad, NE Revolution vs. NYRB June 2, 2018)
New England Revolution 2-New York Red Bulls 1
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – You couldn’t blame Brad Friedel for expressing a measure of vindication following the New England Revolution’s 2-1 win over the New York Red Bulls.
After his team collected five points during an eight-day, three-match stretch, the first-year Revolution head coach cited his players’ commitment to the task at hand.
“Everybody knows that we talk about fitness and we have been from day one,” Friedel said. “Our team is very capable of playing three-game weeks. I’ve also said that we have a tremendous squad, we have a lot of depth in the squad, which we do.”
That depth certainly came into play during Saturday’s conference showdown. With the third game of the aforementioned eight day-span, Friedel called upon reserve striker Krisztian Nemeth to point the offense in the right direction.
Nemeth certainly answered the bell. In his first start of the season, the Hungary international set up Diego Fagundez on a 45+1 minute equalizer, and finished the night with a team-high three chances created.
Cristian Penilla was one of the key cogs in the Revolution attack last night (Photo Credit: Kari Heistad, NE Revolution vs. NYRB June 2, 2018)
Depth up front wasn’t the only development that aided the Revolution on Saturday. By sitting central midfielder Wilfried Zahibo, Friedel went with the trio of Kelyn Rowe-Luis Caicedo-Diego Fagundez in the middle of the park to open the pitch.
“We felt bringing a smaller, little bit different type of midfield suited this game,” Friedel said, “because they try to swarm around the ball.”
Even though the Revolution were able to answer an eighth minute Bradley Wright-Phillips tally before the break, the prospect of a go-ahead was far from a given. Both team’s passing numbers hovered around 60 percent, which led to plenty of disjointed play.
But in the 78th minute, New England capitalized when Caicedo found Cristian Penilla, who slipped a pass across goal for Bunbury before the Revolution striker tapped it through.
“It’s been like that all season,” Bunbury said. “I mean, Penilla is a game changer. He goes at guys all game long, created something out of nothing. It’s my job to kind of be in the mix in the box, and we got the win.”
The late goal was Bunbury’s eighth of the season, which leads the team. It also marked his fifth winner of the year, tops in MLS.
That said, Bunbury was quick to praise Penilla – who recorded his team-best fifth assist in the process – rather than take the credit for his own hot play.
“He makes my job easy,” Bunbury said. “More times than not, he’s going to beat his guy. I’ve got to be in the right position, whether it’s a near post run, far post run, something like that.”
Bunbury and Penilla have both started each of the Revolution’s 14 matches this season, and their performances Saturday were a testament to Friedel’s emphasis on conditioning this season.
The team’s collective mettle will continue to be tested in the coming weeks with league and Open Cup action likely to create fixture congestion as the season slides into the summer months.
But Friedel didn’t seem worried about the approaching cluster of matches after watching his team conclude their trying stretch with a win.
“[I’m] really happy with the performance,” Friedel said. “Really happy again, with the character that the players showed, going a goal down, especially so early. [We] stuck to the plan.”
NE Revolution
New York Red Bulls
