New England not worried about losing momentum

After a flurry of games, the New England Revolution will get a break after Wednesday night.

The Revs will have played four games in the span of 11 days. With MLS still adjusting after the odd 2020 season put them off schedule, teams have been forced to play a lot of games in a short amount of time. In recent games, Bruce Arena has rotated his squad to ensure that he is able to keep everyone fresh and more importantly healthy.

New England has still continued to play well no matter who is on the pitch. Every time they step on the field they seem capable of taking all three points. Matt Polster spoke about the depth on the roster to media members on Monday.

“We have a really deep squad that even when we do rotate – what was it? – nine guys against Chicago, everybody played well and everybody stepped up in those moments to help pick up three points,” the midfielder said. “We’re going to cap off this month with a bunch of games again. It’s important that guys step up again and help us win and get three points against Montreal. Then we have a small break and then we get jam packed with another bunch of games in October. It’s going to take everybody to get where we want to go. It’s important that everybody’s focused mentally and physically to get the job done towards the end of the season.”

But after the game in Montreal, New England doesn't play a game until Saturday October 16th with the United States Men’s National Team returning to World Cup Qualifying. The USMNT has three games during the break which means Matt Turner will get plenty of playing time.

Turner won’t be the only player gone, Adam Buksa was called up to Poland’s preliminary roster and Tajon Buchanan looks to be a permanent fixture for Canada’s National Team.

So the Revolution will have a few players leaving New England and the rest will get quite a long break. With how well the Revs have been playing some fans might be worried about the team losing their momentum.

Polster is taking the positive approach and believes that the break will help the Revs.

“I think it’s good because we’ll be able to – if players need to recover, this is the time to do it,” he said. “Obviously, guys will be at international break and they’ll be playing games still. It’s going to be a break and obviously, you know, you want to just keep playing games and go on with the season. But I think we have to look at it as a glass half full. We can get ourselves back to 100 percent and then kick on from there. So, I don’t see it as much of a negative. Everybody is going to deal with the same thing, so it’s going to be tough for everybody to get back into the swing of things when we come back.”

Brandon Bye also thinks that the break is much needed as New England prepares for a long playoff run.

“I think it’ll be nice to rest,” Bye said. “We’ve played a lot of games. These midweek games, followed by weekend games, like someone said earlier it was four games in 11 days. I think it’ll be good rest for the boys, and obviously some international breaks, international guys going to play for their countries. But for everybody else, it’ll be a nice little breather before the end of the year push.”

So while some fans might be nervous, the Revolution are not worried about maintaining their success after the upcoming break.