Kansas City, KS (Sports Network) - The New England Revolution will try to
bring an end to its two-game losing streak when the club hits the road to take
on Sporting Kansas City at Livestrong Sporting Park on Saturday.
The Revs have sustained back-to-back one-goal defeats and sit only three
points from the bottom of the Eastern Conference, while Sporting will try to
remain on top of the East with its second win in three games.
New England's last outing saw the club go down a goal midway through the first
half against Montreal, but battle back to level the contest before halftime.
But Sanna Nyassi scored the winner for the Impact in the 67th minute, leaving
Revs head coach Jay Heaps with a feeling of disappointment.
"Overall, it wasn't a good performance," Heaps said. "Unfortunately, we didn't
have enough guys who had a good enough game. We lost the ball in areas where
it cost us. It was good to get back in the game after the first goal. But in
the second half, I thought we would could have come out little bit sharper, we
were a little bit flat."
Despite the loss, New England's Darrius Barnes came away with a positive
feeling about how his team responded.
"We've shown all year that we have some fight in us, whether we're up a goal
or down a goal. We showed that again tonight," Barnes said.
However, there hasn't been enough fight in the team to notch more than six
wins in 19 contests this season, meaning Heaps will need more from his side if
they are going to creep back into playoff contention.
Sporting also suffered a loss in its last match, losing 2-1 against Houston
after midfielder Peterson Joseph was sent off in the 45th minute.
Calen Carr netted the winning goal in the 79th minute for the Dynamo, but
Kansas City goalkeeper Jimmy Nielsen felt as though his team did well despite
playing down a man.
"I think we were extremely well organized, and didn't give much away even when
we were a man down," said Nielsen. "We didn't give much away and held a lot of
the possession. It didn't really get dangerous. We created some small stuff
but never got really dangerous."
Kansas City needs to find that cutting edge, but it might be difficult with
Joseph out through suspension and Roger Espinoza playing with Honduras at the
2012 Summer Olympics.
Graham Zusi continues to battle a quad strain, and head coach Peter Vermes has
said he has no idea whether or not his midfield ace will be able to return in
time to feature against the Revs.
The Sports Network