{"id":20427,"date":"2013-07-08T15:03:16","date_gmt":"2013-07-08T19:03:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=20427"},"modified":"2013-07-22T16:08:11","modified_gmt":"2013-07-22T20:08:11","slug":"the-super-subs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=20427","title":{"rendered":"The Super-subs"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Dimitry<\/a>

Dimitry Imbongo holds off two defenders in Saturday’s win over the San Jose Earthquakes. (Photo: Chris Aduama\/aduama.com)<\/p><\/div>\n

After seeing substitutions score just three times in the first 14 games for New England, Revolution subs have found the back of the net in each of the last three games. Despite going just 1-1-1 in their last three, the goals have been important.<\/p>\n

Dimitry Imbongo came on for the last 22 minutes of the Vancouver Whitecaps game and found the back of the net to bring the shorthanded away side within one. Last week, Chad Barrett came on for the final seven minutes and scored the game-tying goal in the 88th\u00a0<\/sup>minute to earn the Revolution a point.\u00a0On Saturday\u00a0night against the Earthquakes, Imbongo found the back of the net in the second straight game he has appeared in, giving New England a 2-0 lead in the 78th<\/sup>\u00a0minute. Though not the winning goal, San Jose has scored nine of their 20 goals in the final 15 minutes of games, making Imbongo\u2019s goal all that more important.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe competition there is great,\u201d said head coach Jay Heaps. \u201cI think that we have, with Juan Agudelo being sidelined for a little bit and having guys like Chad and guys like Imbongo fight for a spot, it\u2019s great. Jerry (Bengtson) as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Revolution improved to 3-1-1 when a substitute comes on and scores a goal, something players in the starting lineup appreciate.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s great. That\u2019s what you want from your subs,\u201d said Lee Nguyen. \u201cYou want them to come in and make a big impact. Lately our subs have been doing really well.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before earning a start on Saturday night, Barrett had two goals in his previous 34 minutes played as a sub. Now Imbongo sits with two goals in his last 44 minutes as a sub.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose guys stepped up to the plate and they do a nice job,\u201d said Heaps. \u201cBut we have a good competition going on there and every week, training does matter. I\u2019ve said that from the beginning; that I want to see these guys earn time and I think they\u2019ve done that.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Imbongo, the appearances that he\u2019s making has been enough to boost his confidence.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m happy that the coach gave me the chance to prove to everybody that I can score goals,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

With Saer Sene also producing up front, Jay Heaps doesn\u2019t have an easy decision when it comes to the starting XI \u2013 and that\u2019s a good thing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Revolution have been getting key contributions off their bench over the past few weeks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":20454,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[3],"tags":[288,49,507,1274,113,76],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/imbongofeature.jpg?fit=490%2C240","jetpack_likes_enabled":false,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20427"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=20427"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20456,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20427\/revisions\/20456"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/20454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=20427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=20427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=20427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}