{"id":28672,"date":"2014-10-23T12:26:45","date_gmt":"2014-10-23T16:26:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=28672"},"modified":"2014-10-23T12:26:45","modified_gmt":"2014-10-23T16:26:45","slug":"forgotten-man","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/?p=28672","title":{"rendered":"Forgotten Man?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"(Photo<\/a>

(Photo Credit: Mark Murray \/ Prost Amerika)<\/p><\/div>\n

At this time last year, Diego Fagundez was the name on every fan’s lips. His\u00a0skill on the ball\u00a0and goal scoring abilities propelled the New England Revolution to an unexpected trip to the playoffs.\u00a0While that run ended in the second leg of the conference semis, the general consensus was that the Revolution wouldn’t have gotten that far without Fagundez.<\/p>\n

A similar sentiment held going into 2014: that the\u00a0Revolution would only go as far as Fagundez would take them. But with the curtains soon to be drawn on the current campaign, it’s clear that last year’s hero has been reduced to the role of sidekick.\u00a0But one question remains:\u00a0will he\u00a0be a factor\u00a0in the playoffs?<\/p>\n

It would make sense to first state the obvious: Lee Nguyen will draw the most attention (and fouls, as we saw\u00a0last week in Houston)\u00a0from opposing defenses. With the focus on Nguyen, the possibility exists that Fagundez could emerge as a valuable attacking option if called upon.<\/p>\n

Even though the spotlight has been cast on Nguyen and Jermaine Jones during the second half of the season, Fagundez has remained a contributor. The 19-year-old attacking midfielder has appeared in 30 matches this season, and created 25 scoring opportunities this season, albeit with\u00a0only three assists to his name. Last season, Fagundez recorded seven assists and created 27 total chances while appearing in 31 games for New England.<\/p>\n

With the regular season finale on tap, now is the time for Fagundez to show his skills against a struggling Toronto FC squad. In perfect world, Fagundez would get significant minutes, score and assist, and enter the postseason with a renewed sense of confidence. And we’ve all seen what a confident Fagundez can do.<\/p>\n

But this isn’t a perfect world.\u00a0It’s unlikely Fagundez will suddenly become his 2013 self between the first and final whistles of Saturday’s match.\u00a0No matter what Fagundez does against Toronto, the Revolution’s success in their opponent’s end will continue to rest on the shoulders of Nguyen and Jones.<\/p>\n

When New England struggled early on in 2014, the thought was that Fagundez would shake the offense out of its funk. That never happened, and as a result, head coach Jay Heaps had to search for other attacking options. Nguyen embraced the task and has not looked back since.<\/p>\n

As they’ve shown since\u00a0mid-August,\u00a0New England\u00a0has fared just fine\u00a0without Fagundez. With Nguyen taking the mantle of playmaker,\u00a0Jones, Teal Bunbury\u00a0and Daigo Kobayashi all bolstering the midfield, and Rowe showing well\u00a0out on the wing,\u00a0there’s no question that the Revolution offense is a much different animal than it was last year.<\/p>\n

Bottom line: if New England does make a deep run into the 2014 MLS Cup playoffs, they’ll probably do so leaning on those who got them there while last year’s leading scorer can only hope he can contribute off the bench.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Once the go-to guy on offense, Diego Fagundez’s role going in the postseason will be far different than it was a year ago.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":19208,"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":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/nesoccertoday.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/fagundezfeature10.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\/28672"}],"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\/26"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=28672"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28672\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":28680,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/28672\/revisions\/28680"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/19208"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=28672"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=28672"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/nesoccertoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=28672"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}