HARRISON, N.J. – In the first two matches of the season, head coach Jesse Marsch had a rather consistent substitution pattern.
Emptying the bench on both occasions, Marsch would start by introducing forward Anatole Abang into the match in the second half, followed by World Cup veteran Shaun Wright-Phillips and midfielder Sean Davis.
The moves were understandable in each situation, and those three remain likely candidates to see more time off the bench in future matches this season. But on Saturday night, Marsch was forced to switch things up in a big way.
It’s hard enough to cope with an injury on the night, but three in one game—all hamstring knocks—is almost unheard of.
“I’ve never seen that,” midfielder Lloyd Sam admitted. “It’s a bit of a freak thing that happened. But it was amazing to come through that and get the win.”
It didn’t come easily, but the Red Bulls managed the victory thanks in large part to their contributors off the bench.
It started midway through the first half as Mike Grella was forced into action, as Gonazlo Veron appeared to re-aggravate the injury that postponed his season debut until Saturday night.
Next, Gideon Baah would come up limping, and the Ghanaian exited the field, visibly distraught. Karl Ouimette was called upon as the lone centerback to fill in on the night, but when Ronald Zubar went down in a heap, Connor Lade was quick to volunteer his services to fill in, but his head coach had other ideas.
“I was pretty clear that Connor played center back in college,” Marsch said after the match. “And Connor's asking me, ‘Do you want me to play center back?’ and I'm going, ‘No, you're playing left back.’ He goes, ‘You sure?" I said, ‘Yes, you're playing left back. Put Kemar at center back.’
With so many pieces in and out of the lineup, pulling off a comeback seemed highly unlikely, but the leaders off the bench made a world of difference.
“A guy like Connor Lade really sticks out to me,” goal scorer Sacha Kljestan said. “He came on the field with a ton of energy and his first play was a hard tackle against Andrew Wenger to send a message quickly. The way he played with the ball, pushed the game, joined the attack, made plays on his side of the field, he was a leader on the field. Grella gets a goal, Karl Ouimette comes in and plays solid; those three guys helped a lot.”
There may not be too many situations that call for three players to fill in on a moment’s notice, but Saturday night proved that any player on the squad is willing and able to step up when called upon.
“The thing I'll say about Karl and Connor coming in is two things that define them as players and as people are that they are two of the most brave guys on our team,” Marsch said. “They're never afraid of big moments. Every time they're called on I know they'll be ready to go. In that sense I thought that they stepped up and they brought some of that to our team tonight, so that was great.
“And Mike is a confident kid. So when he plays, and he starts getting touches on the ball and moving around in the game and wrong footing guys, he can really affect the game in big ways like we've seen.”
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