A Revolting Turn of Events

After a disastrous 1996 season, the New England Revolution made two key moves.

The first was to fire Coach Frank Stapleton and hire Thomas Rongen in his place, even though it cost the Kraft family a fair bit of money to lure Major League Soccer’s coach of the year away from the Tampa Bay Mutiny.

The second was to sign Walter Zenga, the goalkeeper who led Italy to third place in the 1990 World Cup.

On Sunday, Rongen was up in the press box at Foxboro Stadium, rather than on the bench, because of the red card he received last week in Dallas for letting the referee know what he thought of him.

But Zenga was down on the field, and because he was, the Revolution won its fourth game in a row, defeating the Galaxy, 1-0, in a shootout in front of 18,218.

The less said about the 90 minutes of scoreless regulation, the better. If MLS dies, it will be dull yawners such as this that will be the longest nails in the league’s coffin. Looking for video highlights in this tepid affair will be like looking for intelligent life on MTV.

For the Galaxy, the shootout was no better. Here’s how it went:

Cobi Jones was first up for the Galaxy, but Zenga--the former Inter Milan veteran--dived to his left to knock away the shot.

Imad Baba slipped his shot inside the left post, beating diving Galaxy goalkeeper Kevin Hartman to give the Revolution a 1-0 shootout lead.

Chris Armas was next for the Galaxy, but Zenga denied him with a foot save.

Mike Burns, the U.S. national team defender, saw Hartman partially block his shot, which bounced outside the right post.

Robin Fraser’s shot was batted by Zenga

Eric Imler could have clinched it for New England, but Hartman dived to his right to make the save.

Greg Vanney scored for the Galaxy, tying it up and providing a glimmer of hope for the visiting team.

Alberto Naveda, who had scored his first career hat trick and the team’s first hat trick June 2 against the Colorado Rapids, quickly snuffed out that hope, rounding Hartman and putting the ball into the net to make it 2-1.

That left it up to Guillermo Jara to score or be the goat. Jara scored, but such is the Galaxy’s luck this season that the goal was disallowed. Jara had taken longer than the permitted five seconds to shoot.

And so New England, which is 7-0 against Western Conference teams, improves to 9-4 and keeps the pressure on defending champion Washington D.C. United, the Eastern Conference leader. The Galaxy, which started 12-0 last season, is 3-9 after 12 games.

Is there a solution to the Galaxy’s problems?

Perhaps New England last year showed the way.

By October, maybe Rongen and Zenga will be available.

Nothing else has worked so far. Perhaps a revolution or two is in order.

MLS Notes

Preki scored his second goal of the game with three minutes left in regulation to give the Kansas City Wizards a 3-2 victory over the Clash at San Jose. It was the second victory in 49 hours for the Wizards (8-4), who solidified their Western Conference lead. On Friday, the Wizards won the tiebreaker, 3-1, for a 2-1 victory over the Dallas Burn, now 7-6. With Sunday’s loss, the Clash is 4-9.