FOXBOROUGH, Mass. — The stench of the New England Revolution’s woeful form is growing worse and worse.
But players and head coach Brad Friedel are still preaching patience despite the team’s eight-game winless run.
“Morale would obviously be a bit low because of the results, but that doesn’t take away from how hard they work, and again, in almost all of the games, we should be the ones that are getting the points,” Friedel said after training Tuesday following New England’s most recent result, a 1-0 loss to Philadelphia.
“It was another difficult loss, for sure, but we created a lot of chances. … defensively, it was fine. We limited them to only five or six chances and even the chances they created were our own doing from being a little sloppy from the ball. It wasn’t a poor performance. …We have to take confidence and a little bit of solace from the fact that we put in another great effort. I do feel that we were the better team on the day, but we didn’t come out with the points.”
Friedel has offered the same refrain for weeks: That the Revolution (7-10-8, 29 points) are better than their recent results suggest.
But the results, not the effort, are reflected in the standings. Since the Revolution’s winless run started July 7, they’ve slipped out of the sixth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference and into seventh place.
New England is currently four points out of a playoff spot. On the plus side, the Revs have two games in hand on the Montreal Impact (10-14-3, 33 points), now in sixth, and play them later this season. But hurdles definitely outweigh the positives. D.C. United has two games in hand on New England and four in hand on Montreal, and the club is in sparkling form with nine of its final 11 games at home.
No. 5 Philadelphia (11-11-3, 36 points), which beat New England twice in three weeks, is likely too far ahead to catch. In addition, only four of the Revolution’s final nine regular season matches will be played at home.
“We’re still not out of it and we need to know that,” Revolution playmaker Diego Fagundez said. “Now there are nine more games left and we know that every game is going to be a final for us. I wouldn’t say it’s the best scenario, but for us, if we can get this stretch going and get momentum going, then we can get into the playoffs with a little momentum and that’s how we want our team to go. It’s not the best situation right now, but with this team I know we can definitely do it, and it’s possible.”
Friedel and his players have been using the “cup final” language for weeks to reflect how the stakes of missing out on the postseason affect the team’s mentality. It’s an optimistic bid, but one that also hasn’t produced positive results in the last two months.
The Revolution host the Portland Timbers (10-7-7, 37 points) Saturday night at Gillette Stadium. Both teams run their game through the midfield and have scoring threats across the pitch. The two teams are also seeking a change of pace. After going on a 15-game unbeaten run, the Timbers have started to flounder like New England; they’ve lost four straight and have fallen out of a playoff place in the West.
Revolution forward Juan Agudelo, like Fagundez and Friedel, is hopeful his team can parlay its effort into a positive result.
“It’s every single game, it’s not just this Saturday,” said Agudelo. “… Like coach said, there’s no time to make mistakes. We put ourselves in this situation and we can’t make any mistakes if we want to make the playoffs.”