FOXBOROUGH, Mass. – When left back Chris Tierney received a red card in the 52nd minute of Saturday’s match against D.C. United, the New England Revolution had a gameplan.
But when Lee Nguyen followed him out the door just six minutes later? They weren’t as well versed with how to handle the situation of being down two men. Still, they rallied, dug in and walked away with a 1-1 draw against the Eastern Conference leaders at Gillette Stadium.
“You practice being down [to] 10 men,” Revolution head coach Jay Heaps said following the match. “I’ve got to be honest with you, we don’t practice being down nine men. But we just had a 35-minute session, so we’re alright. It’s a hard situation, I think we even had moments to get another goal, but at the same time had to be smart.”
A stylish first half from both sides led to only one goal, a Charlie Davies rebound strike in added time to give the Revs a 1-0 lead at halftime.
Then seven minutes into the second half, on a loose ball along the left side of the Revolution’s box, Tierney, in an effort to beat Chris Pontius to it, came down spikes first on the D.C. forward's knee.
“I thought that the Chris Tierney red card, for me that’s got to be 100 percent,” Heaps said. “There’s no way [the referee] could have seen it from where he was and how quickly he went to the card. You saw his hand go into his pocket within a millisecond of the whistle being blown.
"Those are the situations where you hope that there’s a little more common sense to say, 'Alright, did anyone see it like I did?' If they all agree, I tip my hat, but if just one guy makes the call, then I hope that there is a pause there.”
In the case of Nguyen, who had already received a yellow in the first half, it was an arm to the face of DC midfielder Davy Arnaud that cost him a second yellow after the two got tangled up jostling for the ball.
“I felt the game was pillow fight up to that point,” Heaps said. “There was nothing malicious in the game at all. As much as we’ve got to be smart, the referee’s got to be smart. To be fair to Lee, he got fouled first, it was right in front of us, but he’s got to react better. Unfortunately, he gave the referee a chance.”
“For 52 minutes I felt that we were really good. We were playing the No. 1 team in the East and we were toe-to-toe with them. You have to be smart against a team like D.C.”
Craig Forde covers the New England Revolution for MLSsoccer.com.
