After many missed chances this season, Marco Urena finally found the back net against the New England Revolution on Saturday night.
By Ivan Yeo
LAFC knew what to expect from the New England Revolution on Saturday night.
LAFC knew the Revolution were going to bring a more direct and physical style of play to Banc of California Stadium for Saturday’s match. LAFC was able to withstand the Revs’ style and took the lead on Marco Urena’s goal early in the second half. New England persisted however, and an equalizer by Brandon Bye enabled New England to steal points following its 1-1 draw.
“We got the game we expected from an athletic, physical team,” LAFC head coach Bob Bradley said. “We knew they would come out and try to press us hard. The first 30 minutes, I don’t think we found any kind of rhythm at all, and in the latter part of the first half we started to get a few more chances.”
Diego Rossi led an LAFC break on goal, played a ball to Benny Feilhaber, who played it back to Rossi with an eye for goal. Rossi however miss-hit the ball, Carlos Vela recovered it, had it poked away by Bye, though it went back to Rossi, who then played it back to Urena, who shot a one-timer past Brandon Knighton far post for his first goal of the season and a 1-0 LAFC lead.
New England however was the aggressor from that point on. Juan Agudelo had two point blank looks at goal inside the penalty area, but both times’ he was denied by Tyler Miller, and a shot from distance by Luis Caicedo was parried over the crossbar by Miller. The Revolution persisted, and finally pushed one across the goal line in the 82nd minute, as Teal Bunbury crossed into the penalty area and Bye came in from behind the play and headed the ball past Miller into the back net to level the match. New England also had a chance to win the match, but a chance by Cristian Penilla went off the far post.
“It was a game where they pressed a lot,” Urena said of the Revolution’s style of play. “In the first half, we got our chances when we played behind the defender, and I think in the second half we missed a little bit of that. After the goal, we should have pressed even more to get more confidence. It’s hard to play when you don’t have the ball. They press a lot. They play physically. We’re still working on finding a way to play against teams like that. ”
After a slow start to the match, LAFC started to assert themselves in the match. Vela played a ball to a sprinting Urena in the 20th minute, Urena got inside the penalty area, but aggressive marking by Antonio Milnar Delamea forced Urena to miss to the near post. LAFC had two great chances towards the end of the half. First, Jordan Harvey sprung Rossi for the penalty area in the 43rd minute, but his shot was saved by Knighton. Urena had another chance in stoppage time off a pass from Nguye., but Knighton also denied Urena to keep the first half scoreless.
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