MONTREAL — It took less than three minutes for the smooth-sailing New England Revolution ship to start taking on water. 87 minutes later they were sunk by a Montreal Impact side hungry to prove they're better than their record.
When Andres Romero buried home a slick feed from Marco Di Vaio off a nice run, things looked to be amiss on the defensive end for the Revs, who came in to the match riding a seven game unbeaten streak.
“The start, we were slow,” said coach Jay Heaps in a postgame teleconference. “We gave up an opportunity, gave away a little much, and they took advantage of it."
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“You’ve got to credit Montreal, they came out flying and we were flat. Two minutes in, to give up a goal on the road is always difficult.”
It wouldn’t get much better for New England as the Impact continuously worked long crosses deep into the attacking zone, catching the Revs normally tight defense off guard on numerous occasions.
Then Montreal struck again after a long range shot by Issey Nakajima-Farran that Bobby Shuttleworth was unable to control.
With the Revs defensive focus near the top of the box, nobody was back to clear the ball and Jack McInerney took advantage, swooping in to collect the rebound and fire it home in the 38th minute.
Heaps tried to inspire his team during the break, but there was no way back for the Revolution.
“We got ourselves into that mess and now we got to get ourselves out,” said Heaps about what he told his team at halftime. “Our reaction was good and I thought that we did a nice job at times in the second half, but at the same time it was just a little bit off and we’ve got to be better.”
Di Vaio and McInerney led the Montreal attack with a combined eight shots, five of which were on goal and the Revs seemed overpowered for much of the match, an unlikely sight from one of the better defending groups in the league.
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“They were hard for us to prepare for,” said Heaps. “They played us a variety of different systems. I don’t think anyone underestimated [Montreal] because the message all week was that this team is very dangerous and if you give them anything they’ll take advantage of it, and that’s’ what they did.”
Craig Forde covers the New England Revolution for MLSsoccer.com
