by Graham Tooke, @chelskitooke
Ousted 9.5
Two penalty saves is going to get you an almost perfect 10 in my books. Unfortunate to be on the end of Abang’s tidy finish near the end, but with the Red Bulls gaining confidence he saved superbly from Bradley Wright-Phillips’ low shot.
Beitashour 6.0
Saw the best and worst of Beita in this one. Made a terrible decision to try and foul Zizzo outside the box, embarrassingly getting his bearing all wrong. And then was a tad unlucky to be called for a shirt pull on Abang in the second half. He did however, put in a pin point cross for Manneh to put the ‘Caps ahead.
Waston 7.0
There’s just no beating the big man in the air. Even Wright-Phillips struggled to worry Kendall. His performance was blemished in the final moments when he received a booking for a foul outside the box that will see him miss out on New England next week. His play acting on Kljestan’s sending off was also rather embarrassing as he writhed in a heap.
Kah 7.0
A little slack to allow Abang to grab a goal back for the Red Bulls but other than that lapse he was well organized and allowed his team to retain possession. When you have little to say about Kah, that usually means he had a good game.
Harvey 6.5
Solid day for Harvey as he dealt with much of what came down his flank, without really getting into the attack at any stage.
Laba 7.5
His job was made easier when Sasha Kljestan was sent off early on. From then on he dealt with most of what New York threw his way. His partnership with Koffie is continuing to blossom and may mean Teibert is on the outside looking in for a while to come.
Koffie 7.0
Defensively astute and knows when to foul and break up play unlike his teammate Beitashour. Don’t expect the fireworks to come often but what he does do right in the midfield he does it well. With his confidence growing the mistakes also appear to have been left his game.
Techera 5.0
A fairly invisible outing despite his team getting the win. He was completely out of sync from his teammates as he failed to affect the match, although his introduction to the team seems to have spurred Manneh on to better things.
Mezquida 6.5
Neat in possession and works his socks off all game long, proven by his late bout of cramp.
Manneh 7.5
Gave the ‘Caps the lead scoring his second in as many games. His clever movement allowed him to get in front of the defender and tap in Beitashour’s lovely centre. With Rosales pulling out of the squad prior to the match Manneh made the most of his minutes defending just as much as he went on the offensive.
Rivero 5.5
Set up Froese for the winner with a quick counter attack. However his performance was littered with poor decisions. Being that lone striker he opted to take on the entire defense rather than holding up the ball for his teammates to get involved, choking up possession unnecessarily.
Substitutes
Flores 6.0 (70’)
Didn’t make much of an impression with all plaudits going the way of Froese, but helped the team hold on for the win despite the Red Bulls late surge.
Froese 7.5 (71’)
A swift counter attack with Rivero resulted in a first ever MLS goal for the Homegrown attacker within 6 minutes of his introduction.
Teibert N/A (88’)
