Week 3: Reviewing Red Bulls-United

March 16, 2012: Red Bulls 0, D.C. United 0

Plain and simple, the Red Bulls dominated Saturday's Rivalry Day match-up with D.C. United. Unfortunately, this isn't reflected in the scoreline.

So to illustrate how well the Red Bulls played, we have to fall back on stats. The Red Bulls outshot D.C. by nearly 20 and saw more than 57 percent of the ball. In contrast to the first two games, the Red Bulls showed some real positives.

Positives

• It seems like the Red Bulls are playing more of the possession soccer Head Coach Mike Petke prefers.
• Fabian Espindola looked very dangerous out there. Again.
• The defense was Roy Miller-less and looked much better Saturday compared to the first two games.

Negatives

• You can talk about dominating the game, but they didn't win the game. While this is one of those "draws that feels like a win" the Red Bulls still haven't actually won a game.

Notable Quotes

Petke:

I think we were very unfortunate in certain situations with not coming up with a goal. Other situations, I give D.C. a lot of credit for coming in here and putting in a strong defensive effort. They also had opportunities going forward, but I feel that we sniffed out pretty well. It's a good team we played against today, I'm proud of the boys effort. Obviously I'm not happy with the result, but it's one of those moments that this coaching staff came back in and said ‘Alright, forget about the result for one second and tell me if you liked what you saw' and we liked what we saw.

Dax McCarty:

What more is there to say other than what we showed on the field. It's a great performance from top to bottom. I think probably one of the most dominating performances I've been a part of since I've been on the Red Bulls. I'm not one to really give the whole complain about luck card but that's just unlucky. I don't know how many balls were inside the six, cleared off the line, rolling across, and Bill Hamid, give him some credit, some unbelievable saves. It's disappointing but at the same time you can see the confidence that we played with today and Mike [Petke] instilled that in us before the game. We were ready and I think they had absolutely nothing. That was a complete performance and we haven't had many since I've been here. That was a complete 90 minute performance from top to bottom. Defensively, we were very strong and attacking wise, what can you say, a little more luck and we come out of here with three points.

Relevant Stats