New England Soccer Today

Revs Pick Up Options on 11; Options Declined on Reis, Davies & Others

Photo credit: Kari Heistad/capturedimages.biz

Photo credit: Kari Heistad/capturedimages.biz

The 2014 New England Revolution roster began to take shape on Friday after the club  picked up the options on 11 players, while declining the options on nine and waiving three.

“After every season, we have to take a hard look at our roster and make some very difficult decisions, both for personnel and salary budget considerations,” Revolution General Manager Michael Burns said in a team release. “In our case, we’ll continue discussions with some of the out-of-contract and declined-option players in the hope they will return to the club next year.”

Among those who had their options picked up were goalkeeper Bobby Shuttleworth; defenders Jose Goncalves, Stephen McCarthy, A.J. Soares and O’Brian Woodbine; midfielders Scott Caldwell, Andy Dorman and Lee Nguyen; and forwards Jerry Bengtson, Dimitry Imbongo and Saer Sene.

Goncalves, who was acquired via loan from Swiss club FC Sion in January, had his purchase option exercised by the club as well as the 2014 option on his MLS contract.

The players who had their options declined were forward Charlie Davies, midfielder Ryan Guy, defender Tyler Polak, goalkeeper Matt Reis, midfielder Clyde Simms, midfielder Donnie Smith, goalkeeper Luis Soffner and midfielder Juan Toja.

Three players were waived and will be available to other MLS teams in the Waiver Draft on Monday, Nov. 25: defender Bilal Duckett, forward Matt Horth and midfielder Gabe Latigue.

In addition to those who either had their options declined or were waived, the deals on forward Juan Agudelo and defenders Kevin Alston and Darrius Barnes were allowed to expire.

Meanwhile, four players are already under contract for the 2014 season: midfielder Diego Fagundez, defender Andrew Farrell, midfielder Kelyn Rowe and defender Chris Tierney.

“We’ve been steadily adding pieces to our club and after showing some improvement this year, we’ve retained a core group of players for next season,” said Burns. “We’ll continue to try to strengthen the team this off-season through more signings and the various drafts.”

The Revolution’s 2014 roster currently includes the following 15 players:

Goalkeepers (1): Bobby Shuttleworth

Defenders (6): Andrew Farrell, Jose Goncalves, Stephen McCarthy, A.J. Soares, Chris Tierney, O’Brian Woodbine.

Midfielders (5): Scott Caldwell, Andy Dorman, Diego Fagundez, Lee Nguyen, Kelyn Rowe

Forwards (3): Jerry Bengtson, Dimitry Imbongo, Saer Sene

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