Revs sent off for openers

CHESTER, Pa. — Even with a host of changes on the field and in the technical area, the Revolution suffered through a painfully familiar start in the season-opening 2-0 defeat at Philadelphia last night.

Another road trip went awry shortly after defender Antonio Delamea received a red card for denying a scoring opportunity in the opening half-hour. Anthony Fontana and C.J. Sapong scored either side of halftime to give the Union the win.

Claude Dielna capped a miserable Revolution night by procuring a second yellow card in the late stages to join Delamea on the sidelines for the home opener against Colorado next Saturday.

Revolution coach Brad Friedel said there were some positives and a lot of negatives to take from a night where two more road red cards (six in the past five away matches) undermined the efforts.

“I thought that the players that were on the field — especially with playing with 10 men for such a long period of time, and also with nine men at the end ­— I thought they put all of their heart into the game and poured their guts out,” Friedel said after his first match as Revs coach. “It was not easy playing down a man, let alone two men.”

There were fleeting signs of the revamped structure in place — pressing high without the ball, working quickly in possession — in the opening period, but the Revs slipped into old tendencies when Delamea hauled down Sapong as the Union forward burst behind the line after 24 minutes.

Despite replacing Cristian Penilla with Jalil Anibaba to shore up the defense, the Revs struggled to adjust and contain the Union going forward. Revs goalkeeper Matt Turner — the former third-stringer selected for his first MLS start — produced a couple of good saves to aid the efforts.

Sapong also spurned a couple of presentable chances before combining with Alejandro Bedoya to prompt Fontana’s first MLS goal two minutes before halftime.

“The thing that really hurt the most was the goal before halftime,” Friedel said. “We would have gone in and we could have said what we wanted to say, as we did. We were making it difficult to play in that first bit.”

Teal Bunbury nearly nicked an equalizer during that period after Gabriel Somi started a counter in midfield, but the Union improved after a double substitution just after the hour. One of those substitutes, Cory Burke, squared for Sapong to turn home the second goal after 69 minutes.

Sapong’s effort essentially scuttled any chance of a result, but the Revs sustained one last blow as Dielna procured a second yellow for a foul in the 86th minute.

The dismissal compounds the fallout from this setback ahead of the Rapids’ visit next weekend.

Originally Published: March 4, 2018 at 12:00 AM EST