Ok, any guesses on what the gameday roster looks like? Here is my first take: Caicedo2 Penilla. Gil. Fagundez Caldwell. Caicedo1 Castillo. Mancienne. Delamea. Farrel Knighton
I think this will be very interesting how Friedel addresses this. Last year he was saying Turner was worthy of a Nats Call-up. Cropper then showed up on a milk carton, Turner played the season - until Friedel "gives him a break" and runs out Knighton to end the disaster of a season. Now we get this: https://www.revolutionsoccer.net/po...ts-goalkeeper-battle-heats-revs-draw-viktoria Another goalkeeper battle underway as Cropper, Knighton, Turner all impress “I thought Cody played well today,” Friedel said. “I thought Matt played well the other day and Brad played well the other day and today, so there’s another battle on for the first position. We’ll see how it shapes out.”
https://www.thesun.co.uk/sport/football/8341960/stoke-mls-bojan-new-england-revolution/ This says it is still on. But then there is this: I'm not going anywhere! 🤷🏻♂ https://t.co/JBFD7BSIGo— Bojan Krkic (@BoKrkic) February 4, 2019
Sounds like Giles Phillips is coming: https://www.westlondonsport.com/qpr/football-giles-phillips-usa-loan Not a major deal, but we need CB depth, so I like it. Apparently they saw enough in his trial?
never a bad thing to have competition. Turner came out of nowhere last year. Knighton is basically a career back up keeper. Cropper the young guy with tons of potential. Hopefully Brad handles this the right way.
Wouldn't QPR want their loan to have a good chance of getting playing time? At least assuming they aren't just trying to schlub the player off on some other team (loan to transfer)...
Proving doubters wrong along the way, Buchanan took unconventional path to MLS https://www.revolutionsoccer.net/po...ong-way-buchanan-took-unconventional-path-mls Good article!
As the Revs about that, when they were hoping some of their loanees would get significant playing time in the USL.
Sometimes, yes. But, other times they are just trying to off-load [salary] expenses and/or facilitate a sale. When a player has little playing time to review, it's hard to settle on a transfer fee - so a loan deal with option to purchase is a way forward.
According this https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2019/02/11/warshaw-each-mls-teams-most-irreplaceable-player Mancienne is one player we cannot do without. I don't really disagree. I find the underlined interesting. Seems the fans were not the only ones to notice his poor play last year New England Revolution Michael Mancienne: It was refreshing to see the Revs make a big investment on a center back – upward of $1 million in annual salary, according to MLS Players Association figures. But it also puts a lot more risk on the single player, because they don’t have as many resources to hedge the bet. If he’s poor again, the Revs could have a similar season to 2018.
I thought Mancienne's play was glaringly bad enough that even a caveman could notice (Yes, I'm looking at you Ben Olson). I think that's probably correct as issue 1, but issues 1a, b and c are finding more possession, variety of tactical play and scoring.
Friedel mentioned that on Sunday, when asked about "the press" (in particular, using it in extremely hot, away games). His response was that he wanted "the press" in some form or another, to always be part of the plan - mentioning that Barca, Man City, etc. immediately go full press when they lose the ball. But, he said, the plan is to surround the press with more possession, better passing, more skilled play. So, I'd say he agrees with you. And, he also talked about offense and defense. - defense: he said we gave up 55 goals last year and 61 the year before that. He acknowledged that you will never challenge for Supporter's Shield, let alone not struggle to make the playoffs, with numbers like that. His goal is to get GA down into the 30's. - offense: he said the stats showed we were among the league leaders in chances (I forget the stat - I think it was shots from 10 yards and in), but our finishing rate was one of the worst in the league. So, his focus was to improve the finishing rate (and mentioned Caicedo Dos as a key factor there). And, adding in that finishing better will take a lot of pressure off the defense!
Castillo should help but If his goal is to be in the 30's he needs to address his back line more than taking on a young unproven CB on loan. I can only hope that if they continue to give up goals they will look for help this summer or sooner. As for goals with the addition of Gil and Caicedo i have the feeling we will see better scoring chances and a higher percentage of those going in. I think Gil, Caicedo, Pennila and Diego will be a handful. If Jones and Rennicks are the real deal that will only help. Teal and Juan are streaky players. I don't see Juan helping out much nor do i see 11 goals from Teal again
By xG the Revs actually outscored their chances (48 GF vs 45.1 xG). Thats not to say that the Revs didn't let lots of extremely good chances go wanting last season (I'm look at you Juan), but statistically their offense created about as many goals as you'd expect it to have created, which was solidly bottom half of the league As for GA, getting into the 30's is very ambitious, only 3 teams were sub 40 last year. ~50 seems to be the median, so getting down into the mid 40's, combined with a solid uptick in scoring, would vault the Revs into the east's elite
If the goal is to be "in the 30s" for GA and they end up at, say 43, I'll take it! Far better to fall short of an ambitious goal than to settle for "good enough."
Brad Friedel on another "elite, overseas" addition coming to the Revolution soon:“I’m not going to tell you the position, I hope you understand, but it’s going well. I have a lot of relationships over in Europe and hopefully we’ll see a player coming through the door very soon"— Tom Bogert (@tombogert) February 13, 2019
Someone on Twitter suggested that the mystery 2nd signing could be Jack Rodwell, which I have to admit makes some sense on a number of levels.
Hmmm, English defender, Blackburn connections, not going to be a high cost transfer fee, not a "name" player, but still could be a good player in this league....
Can play in the center of defense or as a defensive midfielder, free agent at the end of the season, might welcome a change of scenery, Revs have been linked in the past, etc... Then again, it's pretty tough to envision a Manager who's spent the last year and a half talking about mentality signing Jack f***ing Rodwell. (If you don't know what that means, fire up the Netflix Machine and watch a documentary called "Sunderland 'Til I Die".)