POSTGAME QUOTES
New England Revolution (4) vs. Real Salt Lake (0)
April 25, 2015 – Gillette Stadium (Foxborough, Mass.)
Real Salt Lake head coach Jeff Cassar
On the difficulty of playing with an injury-depleted roster:
“We’re not going to use that as an excuse at all. We always say we have a deep team and tonight wasn’t our night. We got beat in every aspect: coaching, performance on the field. We got to take this one on the chin and prepare for San Jose.”
On the effect of New England’s third goal early in the second half:
“We talked at halftime about coming out and just taking it one goal at a time. When they got the first one that kind of really reverses everything and I think we lost our way. It’s something we can’t allow to happen but we did and like I said we’re going to take this one on the chin and move forward.”
On what was going wrong with Real Salt Lake in the game:
“There was a lot of things that were going wrong: poor giveaways, losing the second balls, getting ourselves in bad positions and not getting close enough. There was multiple things that went wrong tonight.”
On defender Aaron Maund playing in Foxborough, being from Dorchester, Massachusetts:
“It was an opportunity for Aaron (Maund) to get minutes and for Elias (Vasquez) as well and you know I thought they did a formidable job until the floodgates started opening up and then we never gained control of the game.”
On the performance of goalkeeper Jeff Attinella:
“He really was outstanding tonight – for me, the man of the match on both teams; just multiple big saves and what I can’t get over is that we didn’t have people in positions to help him after he made big saves. The ball’s bouncing around in the box, it’s just unacceptable but Jeff (Attinella) was fantastic.”
On what he told his team at halftime:
“It was gain control of the ball, be aggressive with our thoughts and just take it one goal at a time, make sure we don’t expose ourselves and get open because they have a good attacking core.”
Real Salt Lake midfielder Kyle Beckerman
On if playing without Javier Morales and Nick Rimando affected the result:
“Of course it was going to make the game harder for us because they’re important players for us. But New England played a great game. They’re a really good team, they’re flying high right now and we’re not, and that was what happened tonight.”
On the difficulty of having so many players out through injury:
“Well I think it’s an opportunity for guys to get minutes that maybe won’t, so (there’s) a couple ways to look at it. I think, as many teams will do, they’re going to look at it positively, and that’s what we tried to do – look at is as a chance to get a good result with maybe not all our guys that usually play, and we just weren’t able to do it tonight.”
On Salt Lake’s bright start before New England took control:
“It seemed like we did okay in the beginning. It was about a five minute span where they finished two good goals and we didn’t. And that sort of set the tone for the rest of the game.”
On the Revolution’s level of play:
“They’re a solid team. I think they’ve been together now for a while – a lot of familiar guys. They got a nice front three with some guys coming off the bench that could be starters on other teams, and they’re a good team.”
Real Salt Lake defender Aaron Maund
On his thoughts leading up to the game being from Dorchester, Massachusetts:
“We thought we were going to come in here and get a result and it doesn’t matter where we’re playing we try to come in here and at least get a result.”
On moving on from this result:
“I mean obviously we’ve got to get this past us and look ahead to the next week. San Jose is a tough opponent so we need to get back to the drawing board and figure it all out.”
New England Revolution head coach Jay Heaps:
Opening Statement:
“It was a good start for us and I thought they started well. They came into the game in a good form, good shape and it took us a little while to get control of the game, but once we did I thought we were moving really well and created a lot of chances.”
On how the team created so many chances:
“We wanted to work on our spacing and continue to get the spacing right. I thought we had a good chemistry going. I thought Lee (Nguyen) was finding some nice pockets. But we were defending well. We weren’t giving a ton away so we weren’t retreating a lot. We were finding balls in good areas and that’s the most important, when you win that real estate, where you’re keeping possession and where you’re getting the attack, that’s the most important part.”
On beating a Real Salt Lake team that the Revolution have struggled against in recent years:
“It was good. I think they’ve had our number. I told the guys I think the last time we beat them I was on the field, so that’s not a good thing. The guys came out and there was a little extra energy and a little extra effort to make sure we got control of the game. I think that was the most important, we knew Salt Lake, they control games. That’s what they do. They limit possessions, they control the tempo of the game and we needed to take that from them. It took a little while. You saw the first 10 minutes they had the tempo but, we took it from them and that is what we needed to do.
New England Revolution forward Charlie Davies
On the offensive pressure throughout the game:
“We just came out with good intentions. We wanted to attack. We wanted to create chances for each other. We knew that they were a little bit vulnerable tonight missing their two starting center backs so that’s new guys on the back line and we did a great job of moving the ball and exploiting those new center backs that they had and we found good spaces and I think once we got rolling it was very tough for them to handle and we just kept feeding off the chances we were creating and the energy was right and the chemistry was coming together. So like I told everyone before I think we’re not there yet and I think when we are there, it’s going to be scary. We’re all excited, we’re all hungry, and we want to continue to have success like we had tonight.”
On how the club can take it to the next level:
“The sky is the limit with this team. We’re so talented, we’re so deep, and it’s such a joy to play. I think as you saw tonight everyone had smiles on their faces. We’re all enjoying playing with each other and we’re enjoying playing well and I think it’s still early in the season, I think we still haven’t obviously hit our peak performance yet and I think that’s what ‘s driving us. We have a bad taste in our mouth from last year’s MLS Cup Final and we know what it takes to get there and we want to this time bring the trophy home.”
New England Revolution defender Chris Tierney
On New England’s game plan:
“Attack and keep the ball and play in their end. I think we did that really well tonight. We put them under a whole bunch of pressure. When we’re playing in and around their 18-yard box, we’re not going to concede many goals. Again, we’re really happy with the way we played. Good game plan and we executed it well so we’re really excited.”
On the team’s past struggles against Salt Lake:
“RSL is always a really tough matchup for us. I don’t know that I’ve ever beaten them, so it felt good. They’ve stuck it to us a couple times. I remember my rookie year or maybe my second year, we lost 6-0 at their place, so it felt good to turn that around on them, but we’re looking forward. We played really well tonight and it didn’t really matter the opponent. I think we were going to win tonight no matter what. So if we bring the game that we brought tonight, we’re going to keep moving forward and picking up points.”
On Salt Lake’s tactical spacing:
“Salt Lake plays narrow. They play that diamond midfield, their wide guys tuck in so there’s space to play on the flanks if you can get it there. They press really well which is typical of a Salt Lake team, but if you’re good on the ball and good in possession and have confidence rolling the ball forward then there’s gaps, and we found those gaps tonight.”
