MLS Preview: New England Revolution at FC Dallas

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After having officially completed the preseason, the New England Revolution (NER) is going to head into its Major League Soccer season opener versus FC Dallas at Toyota Stadium.

The New England Revolution, led by team manager and former United States national goalkeeper Brad Friedel, has finished its preseason with decent success and is now striding towards the first match in the Eastern Conference of the MLS at FC Dallas on Saturday, March 2nd at 4.30 PM (ET).

This past Saturday, the Revs wrapped up the preparation for the season with a 2:1 win over KR Reykjavik from Iceland recording goals from Cristian Penilla, whom the club just purchased after featuring him in the starting lineup as loanee in the 2018 season, and defensive midfielder Luis Caicedo. Paired with the 3:1 success over Ukranian Premier League side Dynamo Kyiv, it was the second victory that NER could claim throughout their training camps in Marbella, Spain (January 25-February 8) and at IMG Academy, Florida (February 12-24). Moreover, the New Englands secured two draws and lost four more games. “All in all, it was a very good preseason. The players worked very, very hard,” coach Friedel revealed at “revolutionsoccer.net.”

Traveling to Dallas, the coach does not know if he can count on Juan Fernando Caicedo (loan forward from Independiente Medellin, Columbia) and Revolution’s 2018 defender of the year Andrew Farrell who missed the second leg of the preseason. Caicedo has a little muscular injury and is close to joining the team. Farrell has an eye injury due to a training accident. “Hopefully he (Farrell) will be with us,” Friedel refers to the first game. With on board will be top transfer and designated player Carles Gil. The Spaniard, who earns about $2 million per year, joined the Revolution from Deportivo La Coruña (Segunda Division, Spain). General Manager Michael Burns told RevolutionSoccer.net about the number-10 type player, “I think he’s going to add a dimension to our team that we don’t currently have and hopefully make all the players around him a little bit better.”

In the previous season, the Revs could claim a 2:2 draw at Toyota Stadium, while they experienced a 0:1 setback at Gillette Stadium in New England. Revolution was ranked eighth after the regular season (42 points) in the Eastern Conference being nine points behind playoff seed number six. Opposed to that, last year’s Western Conference playoffs participant FC Dallas conquered the fourth seed having collected 57 points. Nevertheless, the Toros lost in the first round of the knockout stage to the Portland Timbers who, ultimately, lost the MLS Cup final to Atlanta United.

During the preseason, FC Dallas, led by new head coach Luchi Gonzalez, focused on making use of its home facilities. Dallas only traveled for eight days to Arizona where they won the exhibition Mobile Mini Sun Cup in the final versus New York Red Bulls (2:1). Throughout the whole preparation, the Toros only experienced one 3:1 home loss to San Antonio at Toyota Stadium, while recording five victories. Star transfer and designated player Bryan Acosta (coming from CD Tenerife, Segunda Division, Spain) did not get any playing minutes in the preseason because the Honduran is still waiting for his p-1 Visa and International Transfer Certificate.

It is going to be a match with an open-end considering that both teams do not really know where they stand before their season opener.