FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – Diego Fagundez is one of five players – along with Teal Bunbury, Andrew Farrell, Cristian Penilla, and Matt Turner – to have started each of the New England Revolution’s first 10 games of the 2018 season.
That’ll change on Saturday night when Columbus Crew SC visit Gillette Stadium, however, as Fagundez will serve a one-game suspension for yellow-card accumulation.
While the Revs will no doubt miss Fagundez’s presence as their chief playmaker in central midfield – he’s currently third in MLS in chances created (34), according to Opta – head coach Brad Friedel noted that he and his staff have several options as they determine how to fill that gap on Saturday night.
Friedel specifically mentioned Kelyn Rowe, Zach Herivaux and Penilla as three who could step directly into the number 10 role, while he also referenced a midfield trio of Luis Caicedo, Scott Caldwell and Wilfried Zahibo as another option.
“We have a lot of players that can fill in for other players, and we have a lot of players that, once they do get a chance, they can keep places,” Friedel said. “That’s a good thing to have.”
Competition for that spot has been heated during this week’s training sessions, particularly after Friedel made four changes to the starting lineup for last weekend’s win over Toronto. That shakeup has inspired both those who are fighting for increased time, and also those who are battling to win their spots back.
“I thought we got a really good reaction from the players that didn’t start in the (Toronto) game that had been starting some games,” said Friedel. “We’re going to have some interesting decisions to make come this weekend. But all the decisions that we make are all for the one common goal – to get three points.”
Whoever gets the nod in place of Fagundez will have a critical role to play not only in chance creation, but also in the high press as the Revs will look to put Crew SC under pressure whenever possible.
“They’re very stubborn in the way they play; they want to play out as much as they can, sometimes to a fault. We want to take advantage of that,” said Rowe. “We obviously want to do the same in the sense that we want to play the way we [play]. We’re at home, so we want to press a little bit.
“We just want to make sure our fans come out and see a (good) game.”
