It was a frustrating Fourth of July for the New York Red Bulls, as all of the fireworks were on the other side of the ball. After losing 4-0 to the Colorado Rapids, New York has won only one of their last five league games and three of their last 10. And with a frustrated coach hinting at making numerous changes to his roster, the fireworks might not yet be over for the Red Bulls.
"We were not at the races," said coach Juan Carlos Osorio. "We didn't compete today and at the end we got what we deserved."
It was the third game in six days for the Red Bulls, including a couple of cross-country flights and a disastrous loss on Tuesday to USL Second Division team Crystal Palace Baltimore. The players, however, do not believe that fixture congestion is enough to explain away Friday's loss.
"Obviously we've had a busy schedule over the past few weeks, but that's no excuse for what happened," said Hunter Freeman.
In the initial stages of the match, the two teams looked equally matched with neither team doing much of anything on offense. The Rapids were the first to score a goal, and things seemed to snowball from there.
"At the beginning of the game it was fine," said Freeman. "It was back and forth and then on their second chance of the game they scored a goal. Obviously you don't want to be down a goal, but it's not the end of the world. The second one they scored before halftime really put us behind the 8-ball and changed things. We went for broke in the second half and that didn't work out."
For his part, Osorio believed the effort from his team was lacking.
"We just wanted to match them up and play the same system that we have been doing," said Osorio. "That's down to the players and I do not think that anyone can look in my eyes and tell me that they really played today."
Although at times New York maintained good possession in the midfield, they seemed to have few ideas to connect with the forwards other than playing crosses or long balls forward. Some of that was simply taking what Colorado was giving them, and not doing much with it.
"In the first half we had numbers wide and they only had one true guy outside so there was a lot of space there," said Freeman. "We whipped some good balls in but we never really got on the end of them. We kept the ball but we didn't do anything with it; in the final third we didn't have any answers and we lacked some creativity. Give Colorado credit - they did something with their chances."
At halftime, Osorio was clearly already frustrated with his team's effort. When asked what he told the players he replied: "You don't want to know."
By the end of the game, Osorio was not any happier, and hinted at his desire to make wholesale changes to his roster.
"I can't wait for the 15th of July, when we can sign some players and make a very competitive team," said Osorio. "Because at the moment, I think all of our players have had the chance to shine and stake a claim and a lot of them refuse to do that."
Geoffrey Urland is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
