CHARLOTTE – Leading up to the match against New England, head coach Miguel Ramírez said that what mattered the most after last week’s loss against Atlanta was “how the team responded”. The team responded in resounding fashion with a 3 – 1 win against the New England Revolution.
“We really deserve it. We really deserve it. Because of the work that we are doing, the way we are playing. We’re still very new, babies and still very far from giants compared to these big clubs, but we are reducing the distance between them and us.”
“We deserved it and the fans deserved it. It made me sad that we couldn’t give the fans a victory with goals. Not just for the home match but for the away ones. The fans who buy a flight, a ticket, I understand I was a fan at one point too, I know what it feels like suffer through a losing streak.”
Ramírez's tactical changes made all the difference on the night with the team not only winning the game, but winning convincingly playing the way they wanted to play.
“The first thing I look for when I gameplan against an opponent is to first see how we need to defend against them. From there I think about how my team can attack with that set up.
“We thought that to compete against this team, how they behave attacking and defending, was to have four midfielders and no wingers at all. We also played with two strikers, to force New England to adjust because they weren’t expecting to play against a 442 today, they expected us to play in a 433.
“The game is this, how you play with the opponent. We were training during the week some movements with the strikers and midfielders to be able to progress against a 442 diamond. Even though I gave the players instructions, they were also able to recognize themselves the spaces and how to progress”
The team will savor their first win but naturally as the leader of this team, Ramírez is looking ahead.
“I told the guys, we didn’t get to this point, just to get to this point. We want to keep going and win the next game on Saturday. We want to get all six points in these back-to-back home games."
