COMMERCE CITY – The New England Revolution (2-2-1) came into Dick’s Sporting Goods Park and defeated the Colorado Rapids (0-1-3) in a 2-0 shutout, earning their first victory in Colorado since 2002.
After three-straight scoreless draws to open the season, the home crowd of 11,450 witnessed something different on Saturday night: a 2-0 home loss extending the Rapids’ streak without a win to 18 games.
The match started out slow the first 18 minutes until Revs’ midfielder Kelyn Rowe ripped a long ball from midfield where he found forward Juan Agudelo who was running in the box. Agudelo controlled the ball and then tapped it over Rapids goalie Clint Irwin with his right foot; the ball hit the crossbar and landed just behind the goal line.
“It was a good play. We lost the ball in a bad spot. They switched the ball I think 40 yards. The gentleman took the ball down well and we were a bit out of position. The mindset was, [Michael Harrington] probably thought we had good position, moves it up the field, turnover happens quickly and we didn’t make the field narrow enough and were exposed a bit at the back. Plus it was a decent finish so you have to consider that,” Rapids head coach Pablo Mastroeni said postgame.
Just a minute later, Colorado continued their attack when Dillon Powers found an opening while cutting through the box to fire a shot, but Bobby Shuttleworth made a crucial save with his left hand forcing the ball to float just over the crossbar.
The Rapids would have another great chance to get their first goal of the season in the 52nd minute when captain Marcelo Sarvas’ header was tipped just over the goal.
Three minutes later New England became the recipients of a soft penalty call in the penalty box as defender Jared Watts challenged Charlie Davies, who went down to earn the Revs a penalty kick. Replay showed Watts tugging the arm of Davies, but there was never any foot-to-foot contact. Lee Nguyen took the penalty kick, striking the ball to Irwin’s right while Irwin dove left, doubling their score 2-0 (55’).
The penalty on Watts wasn’t the only controversial call of the night. In the 58th minute Darrius Barnes took down designated player Juan Ramirez who had received the ball from Dominique Badji in the box. Referee Fotis Bazakos appeared to point at the spot, but the side official waved the flag for offside.
Juan Ramirez told the media postgame what he saw: “To be honest, I don’t know what happened in that play. I was on the other side and saw that the referee called the penalty kick at first, but then talked to his assistant and decided it was an offside. I can’t tell you if it was or not. Either way we had some chances, but unfortunately we didn’t get a goal today. We’ll get back into training next week and get ready for Dallas. “
Replay showed the foul on Ramirez happened first and the penalty should have been held along with a penalty kick. The non-call of the foul led to a yellow card to Marcelo Sarvas for dissent and the ejection of Mastroeni.
Colorado had three more opportunities to bring the game within reach in the final minutes, starting with a Badji spin move which set up a shot missing the right side of the goal (72’). Three minutes later Ramirez had a chance from a great angle to knock one in, hitting the post. Finally, Bobby Burling’s header hit the left post off a corner in the 80th minute.
Mastroeni spoke of the missed opportunities after the game: “Today we did enough – 17 attempts on goal, hitting the bar three or four times. And were it not for a few saves by their goalkeeper we could have found ourselves in a more meaningful last 20 minutes of the game.”
Colorado will be in search of their first win as they travel to Dallas this Friday for a matchup against FC Dallas at Toyota Stadium at 5:00 pm. You can catch that game on Mile High Sports Radio AM 1550| FM 94.1|96.9 in Boulder.
Jesse Trujillo is a producer and writer for Mile High Sports. He can be emailed at jtrujillo81@gmail.com and followed on Twitter @Jtrujillo1981
