Friday, April 22, 2011

Taking On Benny and the Revs

Kansas City continues the long running road trip tomorrow when they take on the New England Revolution. New England has been a second home to KC over the years as they've only lost twice there since 2000. The Revolution will be debuting a new midfielder tomorrow, probably in a starting role, Benny Feilhaber, who joined the Revolution via the allocation process this week. Feilhaber adds a nice attacking option for the Revs in the midfield along with Sharlie Joseph and Pat Phelan, their midfield could have plenty of room to work with the way that KC's midfield has played lately. It'll be a tough task for KC to get all 3 points, but with the way New York has been playing lately, and the rest of the schedule of the road getting a result here is needed. You don't want to go into New York to take on a confident Red Bulls side next week on a two game losing streak, and three game winless streak.

KC fans are excited about the likely starting chance Aurelien Collin will get in New England starting next to Matt Besler in the center of defense for KC. With the suspension, and general lack of impression from Julio Cesar, this gives Collin and Besler the chance to hold down the starting center back pairing for the immediate future for KC. Plus who doesn't love a player willing to kill for the fans. The question at this point would seem to be who is going to start at d-mid for KC, does the Birahim Diop experiment continue? Or does Stephane Auvray or Craig Rocastle slot back into the starting lineup? With Feilhaber potentially starting for the Revs, I'd rather see Rocastle in there.

Nielsen
Harrington - Collin - Besler - Espinoza
Arnaud - Rocastle - Stojcev
Kamara - Bunbury - Sapong

Number to remember - 10 - That's the number of wins on the road KC has in New England in KC's history, that's the most wins against any team away from home for KC.

Key Match Up - Craig Rocastle/D-mid vs Benny Feilhaber - There seems to be plenty of talk that Feilhaber will start tomorrow for New England which will be an interesting match up for KC's midfield. Feilhaber may not know his teammates that well, but will cause them plenty of problems.

PREDICTION - As I said earlier I think that this is an important game to get at least 1, but probably all three points is going to be needed just for confidence sake heading into the next few games. This is around the time last year where the team fell back to earth hard, hopefully the team can avoid that this time, pick up a big result in a place that's been friendly to them in the past.

KC - 1 (Bunbury)
NE - 1 (Joseph)

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