FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – Leagues Cup 2024 may be over for the New England Revolution, but work has not stopped at the Revolution Training Center. Instead, the Revs have gotten right back to it: reintegrating players on their way back from injury, welcoming new faces into the Foxborough fold, and ultimately preparing themselves to push for the playoffs from their trip to Montréal on August 24 through to Decision Day in October.
“We have nine training sessions to improve and prepare, which is always better than one week,” head coach Caleb Porter said on Tuesday. “It gives us extra time, extra days. In some ways we’re re-establishing some things, especially with some of the injured guys coming back in and being plugged in, and some of the new guys. So, it’s a great week to just re-establish our identity and our game model as we integrate the new guys and the guys back from being injured.”
The lack of a game this coming weekend gives Porter and his staff the opportunity to focus fully on that identity, without having to consider any opposition strategy just yet. And Porter emphasized that New England’s identity is a strong one – one that particularly shone through back in June when the team went on a four-game winning streak, and one that has started to come through again in recent weeks.
“I reminded the guys, we were flying before we started getting injured,” he said. “But I do think we’ve been in good form the last four games – the league game [against] Dallas, and the three [in] Leagues Cup – and I’m really pleased with the defensive side of that, because you look at the four games, we only gave up three goals, and two of them were on penalties. And I like the fight – the fight, the mentality, and the defensive organization.”
With that run of positive form, Porter said, the question becomes: “When we get some of our key attackers back, can we continue that strong foundation of defending, fight, and good mentality, and then add in a bit more quality in attacking threat?”
The last few weeks have also seen the Revolution add footballing quality up and down the pitch, with the additions of defenders Tim Parker and Will Sands via trade as well as winger Luca Langoni and, most recently, midfielder Alhassan Yusuf from overseas. While the latter two have yet to arrive in Foxborough as of Tuesday, Porter was strongly looking forward to their arrivals, and said that, while the two outgoing moves were difficult to make, all four additions would raise the quality of the team as a whole.
“I think everyone’s feeling good,” Porter said of the squad’s confidence. “When you make moves in every window – which, I told the guys that we will make moves every window and our goal is to build a championship team here, which means we need to add players in every window – that’s no disrespect to anybody here, even when we bring guys in in some of their positions; ultimately, the best players will play. It’s best vs. best, and we need really good players in every position to have competition, and then it’s up to them to pick themselves, to perform … With the new guys coming in, it reinvigorates a little bit the competition and stimulates on the training ground that desire to win a job, and to perform, and to play at a very high standard. That’s incredibly important. So, I felt like today that the guys’ confidence was there, but also just the edge and the standard and the desire and the hunger to train hard and win a job was there.”
In terms of Yusuf specifically, Porter says fans can expect to see a complete player with a strong work ethic and a high soccer IQ that will drive play on both sides of the game.
“He’s just a modern midfielder,” Porter said, “very complete, box-to-box, incredible range and athleticism to be able to cover ground, a high level of fitness, on both sides of the ball. You’ll see a tremendous work rate out of him, which in MLS is really important. And he does a little bit of everything – he wins balls, he’s technical and provides rhythm in the build-up, but also he can push on and break lines and run through the lines to provide an attacking threat out of midfield. He does it more with his late runs and his ability to drive and break lines. But he’s just a very well-rounded player.”
Porter also added that all four signings brought with them the experience of having won at a high level, and said he expected that to drive the team on toward their own goals.
“What I love about all the players we signed [this window] is they have championship pedigree,” he said. “We had two guys out and four guys in, and all the four have won championships. When you look at Langoni, in particular, and Alhassan, they’ve both won league trophies and they’re both in the primes of their careers. So, we get a little bit of energy and power in terms of their ability to run, and work, and be dynamic, and cover the ground we need them to cover in our game model.”
With fresh faces joining the squad and familiar faces returning, there is one goal for Porter between now and October: make the playoffs. For the coach, confidence is still high that postseason soccer is within reach.
“For us, obviously we don’t like where we’re sitting now,” he said. “We understand we’re in a hole, we understand we’ve got to win quite a few of these last 11 games. Every game is a cup final, the way I look at it. So, we’re going to take it one at a time. But we’ve got games in hand, and we showed at times this year, when we were fully healthy, that we could beat anyone. And I firmly believe that’s still the case. But we can’t play all 11 games [at once]; we can play one at a time, and in the end, we’re going to approach every one as a cup final.
“We believe. We believe that we have the opportunity and the potential to be in the playoffs. But we know, obviously, that it’s going to take results in these last 11. We don’t need to win all 11, but the mindset is to win the next one.”
