Seven games into the 2017 campaign, the New England Revolution sit in eighth place in the Eastern Conference with a record of 2-3-2, five points out of first.
It was a tough start to the season for the Revolution as they dropped their first two games of the year with a 1-0 loss to the Colorado Rapids and a 2-1 loss to FC Dallas who is the current three seed in the Western conference.
The Revolution, despite the two losses, bounced back against MLS expansion club Minnesota United for a 5-2 thrashing. Revolution forward Juan Agudelo notched a brace to lead his team to their first win of the year.
New England continued their competitive play in the next match against the Western Conference leaders, the Portland Timbers. The Timbers are no joke as midfielder Diego Valeri and forward Fanendo Adi are in top form with five goals each this early in the year, but the Revolution battled for 90 minutes and salvaged a 1-1 draw with an 85th minute Lee Nguyen goal. This was a promising result as the Timbers are one of the top sides in the league.
Head Coach Jay Heaps kept his team focused as they notched a 2-0 victory against the Houston Dynamo. Forwards Kei Kamara and Juan Agudelo added to their season tallies with a goal each in this one. New England held control of this game from start to finish in this convincing win.
The Revolution’s luck ran out in their next match as they traveled to Chicago to take on the Fire, who just added German Superstar Bastian Schweinsteiger to their lineup. The German opened the scoring for Chicago in the 45th minute to take a 1-0 lead. The fire didn’t look back as they proved to be too much for New England when Nemanja Nikolic added two more goals to the Fire’s lead before the end of the game. Chicago currently sits in third place in the East, but just three points ahead of the Revolution.
New England took on San Jose in their most recent game where goalkeeper Cody Cropper was all the difference. The game ended in a 0-0 draw thanks to the 24-year-old, as the final score could’ve favored San Jose if it weren’t for the big saves made by the first year goalkeeper for the Revolution. Cropper is a shining star in the locker room as he is being scouted for the next United States Men’s National Team goalkeeper.
The Revolution look to improve on their record tonight as they take on D.C. United tonight at 7:30. United has dropped their last two matches and sit in one place behind the Revolution.
Nguyen and Agudelo lead the Revolution with three goals a piece this year as they are the main threats, along with Kamara and Diego Fagundez who hopes to notch his first goal of the season. United hasn’t had any emerging threats yet, but they will be battling to end their losing streak.
