The New England Revolution’s downward spiral has gotten worse over the last week. Since they beat Chicago a few weeks ago, New England has lost 3 in a row, 2 in MLS and eliminated from the Open Cup against the Charlotte Independence. But their poor form dates back to the beginning of May. It dates back to their 2-2 tied in Orlando when the Revs blew a late 2-0 lead. Since that game, the Revs are 1-5-4 (wins loss tie), including their Open cup loss. Also, during this time, the Revs have scored FIRST in 8 of those 10 games! First thought that comes to mind when you see that is the Revs defense is at fault, after all, the defense is failing to hold the lead. In most of these games, there always seems to be one or two moments of bad decision making against the defense, resulting in the goals against. It doesn’t help that their is a lack of depth, I blame the front office for this. The Revs started the season a defender short in many people’s opinions.
But what about the offense? Shouldn’t they get some blame? During this 10 game stretch, New England has only scored 12 goals. Sure the defense has conceded 17 goals during this same stretch, blowing leads in 8 games. But how many times has New England been able to go up 2-0 in most of these games? In 4 games, the final scores were 1-1. (I give them a break against DC last month, 2 red cards for Revs players)
My question is, are the issues with New England a defensive problem, or offensive?
To me, its easy to blame the manager, but what else can Jay Heaps do? Start another player down the pecking order in the depth chart?
Easy to blame the defense, and I do, but not 100% their fault. Offense needs to be able to put 2-3 goals a game, and I think this squad has the capability. Charlie Davies is having the best season in years. Juan Agudelo is doing good, good enough to get back in the national team pool. Teal is a good player, has the ability to hit 10 goals a year in my opinion. Lee is clearly not having a good year, despite scoring last game against Columbus. When you have players like Diego who scored 13 goals in 2013, and Kelyn, who hot 7 goals in 2013, coming off the bench, that’s a lot of goal scoring ability.