New England Revolution Have Simple Plan
Keeping it simple
The New England Revolution entered Saturday’s match against Charlotte FC with a simple plan to earn the club’s first MLS win of 2024. While it wasn’t without bumps in the road, the plan was a success.
“It wasn't perfect by any means, but we had a simple plan: defend well, get a clean sheet, and find the first goal,” head coach Caleb Porter said. “We didn't try to create a million chances, but we started from a strong foundation of defending well, and I thought that was probably the best thing we did today. I thought first half, we created some good chances. I’m real proud of the guys, at the end, to weather the storm. Always, when it's 1-0, there's going to be a late push and we bent but didn't break and got the win.”
In his introductory press conference, Porter mentioned how he wanted the Revs to dictate the game with and without the ball and play aggressively. Fans have seen New England try to press opponents to cause turnovers and build out of the back.
This system hasn’t been successful as the Revolution had struggled to score goals and have just secured their first MLS win. Outside backs such as DeJuan Jones have looked timid to get forward and the midfield has been non-existent at times when defending counterattacks.
also touched upon how instead of trying to jumpstart the attack from the back or through the midfield, New England played more vertically and wasn’t afraid to launch balls forward against Charlotte.
Henry Kessler also discussed that when talking to players, Porter stressed that New England needs to return to doing what it does best.
“Something that [Porter] mentioned was just getting back to what we're good at,” the center back said. “So, ‘Henry, what are you good at?’ Defending and playing. Keep it simple. So, doing stuff like that. And that was for everyone. So, just simplifying the game, not trying to do too much, and I feel like it worked pretty well.”
What the Revolution are good at is having players such as Jones bomb forward and send balls into the box. Even without an aerial threat, the addition of outside backs to the attack and their constant whipping of balls into the box caused problems for opponents.
New England also relies on the skill of wingers to get by defenders in 1v1s and create goalscoring chances. Up until Saturday, the plan from Porter seemed to stifle these efforts. Against Charlotte, there was some return of these key features.
The question now is will Porter look to reintegrate his tactics and ideologies to the team moving forward or will the Revolution return to a style of play that might be more familiar and simple to the squad?
The KISS principle exists for a reason. Maybe it is time for Porter and New England to adopt it for 2024. While playing beautiful soccer is a joy for fans to watch, winning is what really matters at the end of the day. Especially considering how the Revs have started the MLS season.
Why would a plan not try and create chances? We are having trouble scoring goals, it seems to me the more chances you take the better your odds of scoring. I get the defensive emphasis but intentionally not trying to score seems a bit problematic.
Simple plan New Coach!