Preview: Montreal Impact vs. New England Revolution | MLS is Back Tournament, Group C MLSsoccer staff Andrew Farrell listed as questionable with a left quad injury Projected Lineup:
I don't think any "kids" use BigSoccer... Start here: https://twitter.com/mls There should be a post shortly before game time. You may have to create an account, I'm not sure. Edit: This link should start at 7:50PM: #IMFC vs. #NERevsGroup C gets going at 8pm ET tonight—watch 𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 (⬇️) on Twitter or on @TUDNUSA/TSN/TVAS!Group Stage by @Heineken_US // #MLSisBack https://t.co/utqvhAnKx2— Major League Soccer (@MLS) July 9, 2020
Slow start... got much better as time went on .... missed two that were good chances. All teams have not looked great
Good to get the W, would have liked to see more of the [many] chances converted. Bou likes the rocket - that was still screaming upwards, you don't see someone roof it from the 18 very often. The poor net. --------------------------------------------- Meanwhile - Really subpar game presentation decisions by MLS, ESPN, TUDNUSA, Revs, etc. The Spanish channel on cable isn't widely available - it's only on a very high service level on FIOs; and the other option, the twitter feed, was pretty low-res, so linking to TV was useless. And the feed stopped with a few minutes left, (WTF). Viewership in the Twitter feed started at 40K I think was down to about 5K in 1st half, dropped steadily toward the end. The proof is in the numbers - MLS and Revs stumbled badly on their first step back, IMHO. Whoever thought this was a good way to show a "showcase" "We're Back!" sort of game should be fired. Now. Or even yesterday.
I'll take it. I think The Revs clearly deserved the points tonight. If the finishing was better they would have won by more. Out shot them by quite a bit but didn't get a great proportion on target. Hopefully that's rust and will come. That said Bou's finish was a beauty when it did come. Watched the first 60 minutes on mute as I was on an unrelated skype call. Figured I wasn't missing anything on commentary because it was in Spanish. Was pleasantly surprised that I must have had the SAP on auto because when I turned the sound on I got English for the rest of the match.
The commentators were terrible. IIRC, at one point, one of them was referring to a Montreal defender as Kessler. And then another said the Revs ALMOST made the playoffs last year. I don't know if it was a language issue and maybe they would have been more comfortable speaking in Spanish, but they just sounded very unprepared. Do we know if the audio on radio was just a simulcast of the TV broadcasters or did Feldman do the radio? I actually missed him - that's how bad it was.
More than once! The play by play guy called the Montreal defender Kessler two or three times by my count. I was waiting for him to correct the record, but he kept on going....
So the Revs start with this: 30GKMatt Turner 13DFMichael Mancienne 15DFBrandon Bye 19DFAntonio Mlinar Delamea 28DFAlexander Büttner 6MFScott Caldwell 7MFGustavo Bou 11MFKelyn Rowe 22MFCarles Gil 70MFCristian Penilla 9FWAdam Buksa Farrell must have hurt his quad during practice. I doubt we see him next game. Good win for the boys. You can see some rust but for the most part they were less rusty than Montreal. Surprised not to see Zahibo or Fagundez. The Rowe Caldwell pairing was interesting. Buttner is a solid addition to the back line. I love Bou and that was a quality goal but he never saw a shot he didn't like. That's good and bad some times. Love watching Gil.
I thought the Revs deserved to win if you look at the stats. We outshot them badly and had more possession after a slow start. We got better as the game went on but still have a lot of work to do. At times, I thought we looked slow on defense .... or else Montreal was fast? My biggest concern is the lack of involvement of Buska. Im not blaming him though..... Bou and Gil seem to like to pass to each other on attack...period. Arena has to get them to involve Buska more IMO.
I was in the car for some of it, so I listened to 98.5. It was Feldman and Davies. Much better than the Twitter broadcasters.
The 4 months of rust showed (as it did in the other MiB games), but I'm happy the Revs are back and happy with the win. Ten of the eleven starters played 80+ minutes, so gotta be pleased with the fitness level.
I was at Gillette and it was a lot of fun. Feldman and Davies did play by play over the Canadian Spanish video broadcast. The field noise sound was about 10 seconds ahead of the video though so you knew when a heavy foul had been committed. There was definitely some rust but kind of expected that. Buksa had several near misses being just a step late. This attack looks like it could become very interesting. I was most impressed with the improvement in the back. Much more organized and the team defensive work and spacing looked much better. Bye had a rough first half but was much better in the second. Hats off to whoever came up with the drive-in watch party idea!
We'll take the W, even if we looked a little rusty. It seems that this team is much, much better than they usually have been a t the start of the season in terms of being organized and playing as a cohesive unit. The atmosphere was quite lively, considering there were no fans present!