Curt Onalfo on The Soccer Show: “We wanted to get better in every area that we could”
The New England Revolution need no reminders about how difficult the 2024 MLS season was for them. A combination of inconsistency in the attack and poor performances on the defensive end saw New England lose 21 of 34 games last season, leading to a 14th-place finish in the Eastern Conference.
So, when Revolution Sporting Director Curt Onalfo sat down and listed out his list of goals for the offseason, his club’s main priority was simple.
“We just wanted to get better in every area that we could have” Onalfo said on the first episode of The Soccer Show for the 2025 season, hosted by D.J. Bean.
Onalfo and the Revolution didn’t take their shortcomings in 2024 lightly. New England kept itself active and busy throughout the offseason, revamping its roster with 14 new incoming players and a total of 31 transactions.
“We had a really poor season [in 2024],” Onalfo said. “We leaked goals, we weren’t good defensively, and we didn’t score enough goals offensively. As a starting point, we needed to get better in those areas of the field.”
Defensively, the Revolution rebuilt their central defense by adding a pair of international center backs in Brayan Ceballos from Colombia and Mamadou Fofana from Mali, along with MLS veterans Tanner Beason and Wyatt Omsberg. New England also acquired right back Ilay Feingold, a 20-year-old from Israel, via the MLS U22 Initiative.
In the attack, New England bolstered its array of scoring threats by adding former Inter Miami CF striker Leo Campana and Cameroonian winger Ignatius Ganago. The Revolution also acquired a pair of MLS veteran wingers in Maxi Urruti and Luis Diaz, and central midfielder Jackson Yueill.
And of course, the Revolution return 2021 MLS MVP Carles Gil, who’s set to begin his seventh season in New England.
“You see a smile on [Gil’s] face now again, which is really encouraging,” Onalfo said. “He’s developing a really good partnership and chemistry with the other attacking players, and I think that will only get better.
“His mindset is good. He’s excited, just like we all are.”
So how will the new-look Revolution come together with 14 new faces on the roster? Onalfo said it starts with Head Coach Caleb Porter, the two-time MLS Cup Champion who returns for his second season in New England.
“It’s a difficult challenge, but we have an experienced coaching staff,” Onalfo said. “That’s Caleb and the coaching staff’s job, to cultivate a team, an identity, and everything else. They’ve done a good job in a short amount of time.
“The important thing is to make sure you’re getting better every day, a little better every day. Then you just keep looking back on things. After the preseason, we’re very optimistic about where the group is. We know we still have a long way to go to continually get better collectively but that happens with hard work and the training environment every day in training.”
New England opens the 2025 MLS season tonight, with an 8:30 p.m. kickoff at Nashville SC. Watch the Revolution’s season opener on MLS Season Pass on the Apple TV app or listen here on 98.5 The Sports Hub.
