Toronto earns single point
There was no Il Magnifico magic for Toronto FC on Saturday night. But there almost was.
TFC’S new attacking star Lorenzo (Il Magnifico) Insigne missed on a penalty kick late in the match against host New England Revolution at Gillette Stadium. A goal would have given Toronto the win and three points. Instead, the two Eastern Conference rivals grinded out a 0-0 draw.
Under normal circumstances, a point on the artificial turf in New England would be an excellent result for Toronto. But, with only 11 games remaining in MLS regulation play and the Reds seven points out of a playoff spot with six teams to climb over, TFC desperately needed a victory.
The result was a second straight clean sheet for the Reds and goalkeeper Alex Bono, the first time the club has recorded back-to-back shutouts since Oct. 2020. Bono recorded his shutout in his 150th appearance for the club.
“Since I’ve been (with TFC) this has been one of our toughest away trips,” said Bono. “Coming here is never easy. I thought we did enough to win. I thought we defended really well.”
Insigne’s dramatic moment came after TFC was granted a penalty kick in the 76th minute. The Italian international took the shot and was denied by New England goalkeeper Djordje Petrovic, who dove to his right to make the save as the ball headed towards the lower left corner of the goal.
There weren’t a lot of scoring chances in the match as the Toronto backline stood tall, particularly Domenico Criscito and centre backs Chris Mavinga and Lukas Macnaughton. Midfielder Michael Bradley also had a strong game. Macnaughton and Bradley made a handful of key blocks as the Revs pressed for the win in the dying minutes.
“It does seem over the last few games we’ve kind of taken a turn in terms of trying to be stingy defensively,” said Bono. “The guys that are putting in the work in front of me have been working their asses off to try to limit crosses, limit chances. There were a couple of shots from a long way out today and that’s exactly as a goalkeeper what you like to see.
“I’ve been really happy with the defence and the way we’ve played as a group defensively over the last few games and this is something that we definitely plan to keep going as we come into this final stretch of the season and we push for a playoff spot,” Bono added.
With the tie, New England is now winless in six straight matches.
The Revs held the edge in possession (55 per cent to 45 per cent) but TFC recorded 15 total shots to 13 by the hosts and Toronto directed three shots on goal to two by New England. The visiting side also had nine corner kicks to only three by the Revs.
TFC was coming off a shoot-out loss last Tuesday night against the Vancouver Whitecaps on the Canadian Championship final — the first of two straight games on the turf for Toronto. Again, the turf appeared to hobble the TFC attack on Saturday.