MONTCLAIR, N.J - As he sat at his office at Montclair State University after training Friday, Red Bulls coach Bruce Arena thumbed through the New England Revolution media guide with amazement and a tinge of jealousy.
He went from player bio page to player bio page, from Steve Ralston to Jay Heaps to Taylor Twellman to Shalrie Joseph and noticed the same thing on each page.
"All these guys have been there for like six seasons," he said. "That's a real plus."
It's that type of roster consistency that has made New England a perennial MLS Cup contender and it's something that Arena strives for with the Red Bulls.
"That's what you want to be able to do because you can't turn your roster over a whole lot in this league," Arena said. "We're going to be in that grind for a couple of years until we get it right. But you just can't do it, you can't make radical changes. There's not the pool of talent domestically to help you, nor the resources to bring in players abroad."
For now, the Red Bulls roster is in flux. Arena has recently retooled the backline and is still looking to make moves. One bargaining chip Arena has now is an additional Senior International slot available since former Dutch international Dave van den Bergh has obtained a green card.
That gives Arena the luxury of looking abroad for help this year or beyond.
"It's an ace in the hole," Arena said. "Even if it's not a person who you perceive as a high caliber player, just to have that slot available to use for a player in the pinch isn't a bad thing."
The Red Bulls enter their first of three meetings with the Revs in first place in the Eastern Conference despite coming off a brutal stretch of six road games in their last seven games. The Red Bulls played their worst soccer of the year, going 2-4 in those games, including a 1-0 win at Colorado Sunday.
Now the Red Bulls embark on five consecutive home games and won't need to take another flight until Sept. 9, since it's likely they'll take the train to D.C. Aug. 22 and bus to Gillette Stadium Aug. 25.
"A road trip in this league, whether it's an hour flight or a four-hour flight, is a marathon. And it takes a lot out of you," Arena said. "The last three weeks or so have been rough, but having said that, it's no different than anyone else, I guess."
The grueling travel is something that Claudio Reyna and Juan Pablo Angel aren't used to after taking buses to most road games in the English Premier League.
"In England very rarely do you have to take a flight. Normally it's a bus trip and the longest one is four hours, which is not too bad," Angel said. "You play the game and in the evening you go home, which is great. Here the distance is pretty far and you have to deal with the airports, delays, which is not really the best. We have to deal with that and adjust to it."
Angel is tied with Eddie Johnson for the league lead with nine goals, including goals in six straight games at one point. But the former Aston Villa striker, who isn't in the league's top 10 in total shots, is scoreless in his last three games, in part because the service has been lacking.
"We're not creating as many chances as I would like to and I've been lucky enough to convert the few that I have," Angel said. "I'm not worried about the shots, I'm worried about the goals. If I have one chance and I'm able to convert it, I'll take that all day long."
Part of the problem, Reyna said, is relying on van den Bergh and rookie Dane Richards to provide the crosses from the flanks. The Red Bulls captain said if the fullbacks, Hunter Freeman on the right and Kevin Goldthwaite on the left, can also join the attack and put quality balls in the box, Angel should have more quality opportunities. But even that might not be enough.
"(Angel)'s a marked man, as well," Reyna said. "I think you can tell guys are keying on him and whenever there's a ball out wide, he's being held and marked very tightly because they know you can't give him a chance or a sniff because he's deadly at putting the ball away."
In the Red Bulls' 1-0 win at reeling Colorado, central defender Carlos Mendes left in the 54th minute with a right calf contusion. Arena moved Seth Stammler alongside Jeff Parke in the back and brought in seldom used Joe Vide to the midfield.
Vide, who played all of one minute this season coming into the match, played well, nearly scoring seconds after stepping onto the pitch.
"Joe did a good job, it was really nice to see," Arena said. "[At the beginning of the season] he wasn't in good form, we were pretty tough on him and Joe being Joe, who is really a great kid as a starting point, he took what we had to say. I'm sure he wasn't always happy about it, but he plugged away at it."
Vide, who is a viable option off the bench Saturday night, said it's taken him some time to find his niche on Arena's squad.
"I wish I could say it's happened overnight. It's an ongoing process and I'm not even there yet," the second-year developmental midfielder said. "This is something I want to do and Bruce Arena, being who he is, if he says I need to work on something then he obviously knows best."
Mendes trained with the Red Bulls Friday and Arena was optimistic, saying the defender appeared to be "pain free." The prognosis for Dema Kovalenko, who has missed the last four games with a right groin strain, isn't as rosy.
"There's some qualities that Dema has that are real special that we don't have throughout our roster," Arena said. "We certainly miss him."
Dylan Butler is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
