FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – It wasn’t for lack of trying, but in the end the results were all too familiar for a New England Revolution home opener.
For the fourth straight season, the Revs failed to get on the board in their first tilt of the year at Gillette Stadium, despite getting off 18 shots, and in the end the home team was left frustrated by their inability to finish on the day.
“This is a game where we had many opportunities to take advantage of chances to score and it didn’t happen for us today,” said Charlie Davies, who came out of the game in the first half with tightness in his left hamstring. “We have to capitalize on the chances that we had. It’s only the beginning of the season. We have high expectations and high hopes this season, so it’s good to see guys are frustrated and guys want to win.”
Half of the Revolution’s shots were off target, including a Kelyn Rowe effort in stoppage time that drifted wide of the left post, and six more of their shots were blocked by the DCU defense, which worked hard all day to tighten the screws on New England’s attack.
“Credit to D.C., they did great in bunkering in,” said Lee Nguyen, who accounted for two of three Revolution shots on target. “We were expecting that from them. We did create quality chances, but unfortunately it didn’t fall for us today.”
While past history of scoring, or lack thereof, held no bearing for the club on this day, the idea of being home and wanting to put crooked numbers on the scoreboard factored into their urgency and might have played a small part in that not happening.
“I think we felt the pressure to score today because D.C. was sitting in, defending and they were making things very difficult for us,” said Davies. “We were just antsy and I think we were trying to score too much, I guess. I think we were forcing things and things wouldn’t work out for us in the end.”
