New England Revolution will be hoping to return to winning ways tomorrow when they welcome New York Red Bulls to the Gillette Stadium.
As for the visitors, they have lost just once in their opening four matches, ensuring that they enter the weekend in fifth position in the Eastern Conference.
Match preview
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Confidence will be at a premium after New England lost their last three matches in all competitions, including a 3-1 defeat against Charlotte FC last time out.
Real Salt Lake City condemned the Revs to their first defeat of the season on March 13, and a second loss quickly followed when U.N.A.M beat New England 3-0 in their second leg of their CONCACAF Champions League contest.
The result brought the tie back to 3-3 on aggregate after the Revs had won 3-0 in the home leg, but with momentum in their favour, U.N.A.M won the subsequent penalty shootout to eliminate their MLS opponents from the competition.
Charlotte FC piled more misery upon Bruce Arena's side with the latest expansion team winning 3-1 to claim their first-ever MLS victory.
Having played back-to-back away matches across all competitions, New England will be grateful to return to home comforts this weekend and the hosts will be looking to take inspiration from the fact that they have beaten New York Red Bulls in their previous three competitive meetings.
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NY Red Bulls may have lost just one of their opening four matches, but after starting the new season with back-to-back victories, they will be frustrated that their last two outings have resulted in just a single point.
Opening the campaign with two away fixtures may have worried Gerhard Struber, but as it proved it was a challenge that his side rose to, with San Jose Earthquakes swept aside via a 3-1 scoreline before a trip to Canada resulted in a 4-1 victory over Toronto FC.
Surprisingly, it has been at the Red Bull Arena where NY Red Bulls have failed to impress, with a loss to Minnesota United followed by a 1-1 draw against Columbus Crew in their most recent outing.
The meeting with the Crew looked to be heading towards a goalless draw before Tom Barlow netted in the 84th minute for the Red Bulls, but Barlow and his teammates were denied a first home victory of the season when Darlington Nagbe scored a dramatic equaliser in the fifth minute of stoppage time.
Although they will be disappointed by their last two results, the Red Bulls are still yet to drop points on the road this season, and they will look to keep that record intact on Saturday.
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Team News
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With Matt Turner still out injured, New England will continue to line up with Earl Edwards Jr in goal.
Emmanuel Boateng has started the last two MLS matches for the Revs and the 28-year-old is set to retain his place in the side for Saturday's contest.
The New England line is set to be led by Jozy Altidore, who was given his first start for the Revs against Charlotte last time out.
NY Red Bulls, meanwhile, are still without the services of Cameron Harper, Wikelman Carmona and Andres Reyes due to injury issues.
Struber is expected to continue with a back three made up of Thomas Edwards, Sean Nealis and Aaron Long.
The Red Bulls boss could, however, make at least one change to the side that started against Columbus Crew, with Cristian Casseres set to replace Dylan Nealis in the starting lineup.
New England Revolution possible starting lineup:
Edwards Jr.; Bye, Gonzalez, Bell, Jones; Polster, McNamara; Lletget, Gil, Boateng; Altidore
New York Red Bulls possible starting lineup:
Carlos; Edwards, S. Nealis, Long; Morgan, Amaya, Yearwood, Tolkin; Morgan, Fernandez, Klimala
We say: New England Revolution 2-1 New York Red Bulls
Although the Revs have endured a poor run of form, they have fared well against the NY Red Bulls in recent times, and we think they will utilise home advantage to claim all three points on Saturday.
Top tip
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a New England Revolution win with a probability of 51.31%. A win for New York Red Bulls had a probability of 25.1% and a draw had a probability of 23.6%.
The most likely scoreline for a New England Revolution win was 2-1 with a probability of 9.68%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 1-0 (9.62%) and 2-0 (8.41%). The likeliest New York Red Bulls win was 1-2 (6.38%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (11.08%). The actual scoreline of 0-1 was predicted with a 6.3% likelihood.
