"As heartbreaking as this is, we will use this."
That was Jesse Marsch's message following the team's loss in the U.S. Open Cup Final. The New York Red Bulls lost, 2-1 to Sporting Kansas City on Wednesday night.
"We’ll use this to build confidence because this is a tough place to play, this is a really good team, and we came here and we played it really, really well," Marsch said.
The head coach said he was confident and pleased with the way the team played.
"I feel like our team went after the game, dictated the pace of the game in many ways, controlled many parts of it and were unlucky not to come away with more," he said.
Despite the team's strong play, Marsch knocked the Red Bulls work in stopping the counter-attack.
"I thought we were the aggressor for almost the entire 90 minutes," he said. "I thought we went after the game in a big way. I thought we caused a little bit of trouble for ourselves in the first half by giving away some transition moments and not being alert enough to pick up some of their quick guys in transition."
New York will hit the final stretch of the season, with six games remaining in the regular season, and will use this loss to help them work through the rest of 2017.
“The outcome is obviously heartbreaking, but the performance is what I think we’ll carry with us. In the moment, there’s no consolation prize," Marsch said. "But the confidence that this group has, they way that they played and the way that they played for each other, this will continue to make us good.”
