Orlando City Soccer Club coach Adrian Heath has been busy this past month preparing for his club’s inaugural Major League Soccer season next year.
But not too busy to keep pace with the MLS Cup Playoffs, presented by AT&T.
With MLS Cup 2014 set to take place at StubHub Center on Sunday between the LA Galaxy and New England Revolution (3 pm ET; ESPN, UniMas, UDN, TSN1, RDS2), Heath offered up his prediction to MLSSoccer.com earlier this week.
“I think It’ll be the Galaxy, but I think it’ll be a lot closer than people think,” Heath said. “It certainly won’t be the 5-1 that the Galaxy beat the Revs a few months ago [on July 16]. I just think the Revs have got a good team and will make a really good go of themselves the best they can.”
The Galaxy are competing in their league-best ninth MLS Cup final, and are in search of a league-record fifth title. The Revolution have gone winless in four previous MLS Cup finals; two of those losses came at the hands of the Galaxy in 2002 and 2005.
Heath, who scored 71 goals and won two First Division titles with Everton (1985, 1987) during an 18-year career in both the English and Spanish first divisions, is intrigued by Sunday’s final, as it features some of the top goalscorers in the league.
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“It’s going to be a really good final,” Heath said. “A team with the attacking players of [Landon] Donovan, [Gyasi] Zardes and Robbie Keane [going against] a Revs team that’s probably been the most in-form team the past two months of the season.
“The Revs have played some great football. Obviously Charlie Davies has come back to life and everybody’s pulling for him after his horrific car crash, and Lee Nguyen has arguably been the MVP for the league this year. They’re doing a lot of good things, and the addition of Jermaine Jones has given everybody a huge lift in New England.”
Nguyen had the lone goal for the Revolution in the loss suffered on July 16 -- the only match-up between the two teams this year. Zardes and Nguyen's fellow Volkswagen MLS MVP candidate, Keane, each scored twice for the Galaxy.
