CHESTER, Pa. — Philadelphia Union captain Alejandro Bedoya stormed into the locker room at halftime on Saturday night after a frustrating end to the first half against the New England Revolution.
The midfielder knew his team could play much better than it did in the opening 45 minutes, and he wanted to make sure no excuses were made for the performance in the second stanza.
“I came storming in here,” Bedoya said. “I got in here and I was pissed and I let everybody know that was not good enough, that we weren’t going to use this third game (in seven days) as an excuse that we were tired or anything. We needed to pick it up. We needed to match their intensity.”
“They had a lot more clear chances than we did,” Bedoya said. “We just had to be quicker moving the ball. We knew that there was plenty of space. I could feel it in the first half. When we had the ball, it was easy to move through their lines. We didn’t really match their intensity.”
The Union responded well to the veteran leadership displayed at halftime by clobbering the Revs with five second-half goals.
Two minutes into the second half, the Union were back in the lead by way of an individual masterpiece delivered by Ilsinho.
“The early goal helped a lot and set the tone for the second half,” Bedoya said. “After that, it was a lot easier.”
In the final 20 minutes, the floodgates opened with substitute Sergio Santos leading the charge by scoring a pair of goals. By the time the final whistle sounded, five different players found the back of the net for the Union.
“The game just became so open after that second goal,” Bedoya said. “One of the other things we said was we know we’re so much better of a team than they are, especially here at home. We knew we were going to outplay them. We knew we were going to have the ball.”
Union manager Jim Curtin debated losing his mind in the locker room, but he had trust in his veterans to deliver the message that had to come across.
“The veterans have their finger on the pulse of things, they know when it’s not us, and that first half was not us,” Curtin said. “We were lucky to have it only be 1-1 and have a good response starting with Ilsinho making that play and then a lot of our forwards coming to life and doing what they do best.”
The veteran leadership in the squad provided by Bedoya, Haris Medunjanin, Ilsinho and others will be one of the keys to the squad’s prolonged success.
This is a team that doesn’t get too high with victories and doesn’t drop too low after defeats and that’s a credit to the trust Curtin has put in his veterans to control the locker room.
The halftime talk lit a fire under the Union and unleashed a five-goal fury that gave the league notice that this is a team is ready to contend for first place in the Eastern Conference until October.
Attackers Making Better Use Of Shots
Entering the month of May, the Union put 36 of their 112 shots on target.
In the last two games against FC Cincinnati and New England, the Union have been much more opportunistic with their attempts.
Of the 39 shots taken in May, the Union have put 23 on target, including a team single-game record 15 shots on target on Saturday night.
By putting a high volume of shots on goal, the Union are able to avoid being stopped by a fantastic goalkeeping performance.
FC Cincinnati’s Spencer Richey put in a terrific performance on Wednesday, but his six saves weren’t enough to keep the expansion side in the game.
The same can be said about New England’s Cody Cropper, who made nine saves but still conceded on six occasions.
Curtin and the Union players admitted they could have scored more than six goals, especially in the final 20-minute stretch in which they bombarded the penalty area.
“It was just a matter of being more urgent with it and being quicker,” Bedoya said. “After that, spaces started opening up, we started playing through and having fun and the floodgates just opened. I think we could’ve had almost 10 goals if we were sharper.”
Santos was the catalyst for a majority of the chances in the final 25 minutes. The Brazilian put in a difference-making performance with two goals, and the rebound from his shot in the 88th minute dropped to David Accam for the sixth Union strike.
What better than one Santos DOOP? How about another one.
#PHIvNE 4-1 | #DOOP pic.twitter.com/P1FY8G7ILs— Philadelphia Union (@PhilaUnion) May 5, 2019
Curtin and Santos joked around after the match that the Brazilian should have scored more than twice.
“Yeah, he should have had five goals honestly,” Curtin said. “He has the quality to score and be dangerous. You could see his movement in the box, how dynamic he is. He has that knack for when balls are bouncing in and around there, his movement, it’s powerful, it’s fast.”
“Maybe not five, but probably four,” Santos said through a translator. “It was a great night. The team won so I’m very happy.”
Elliott Scores Another Against Revs
Three of Jack Elliott’s four career MLS goals have come against the New England Revolution.
The center back added an 11th-minute goal on Saturday to the brace he scored in August 2018 against the Revs.
Elliott displayed a deft touch in the box while turning and placing the ball on his left foot to finish past Cropper.
“I found myself in the box in quite a lot of space,” Elliott said. “Haris played the ball to me, and I knew I didn’t have a lot of time, so I took my first touch, got it in front of me and hit it, and it went in. People see it in training, but maybe not so much on the pitch.”
Elliott’s opener occurred after Carlos Miguel Coronel made a terrific double save on the other end of the field.
Once the ball went into the back of the net, the Union players rushed over to the bench to hold up the jersey of Cory Burke, who will miss at least three months due to visa issues in Jamaica.
The guys recognize that Cory did a lot to help us get to first place 🔥#DOOP pic.twitter.com/XPTjg58BVy
— Philadelphia Union (@PhilaUnion) May 5, 2019
“(The Burke situation) is confusing for (the players),” Curtin said. “Cory sent a pretty heartfelt message to the group on our group app that we have and share. I think it hit with a lot of guys, you could tell by a lot of their responses. He’s with us in a way, he wants to be here and you can still feel it. The guys all feel his absence and they wanted to do something special for him.”