4 months. 4 months since we couldn't count on a full squad. And boy, was it felt. But could our initial fortunes be coming back to us? All of a sudden, no more injured (except Tafer and substitute keepers Vercoutre and Lopes), no more suspended (Dabo has served his three matches after being sent off against Saint-Etienne).

FC Sochaux-Montbéliard vs. Olympique Lyonnais,

Ligue 1 , Matchday 13.

It is time to pick up the pieces. Real Madrid redefined the words ‘Demolition Derby' for us these past few weeks. But more significantly, they've left Lyon on the verge of being knocked out from the Champions League after the group stages.

Ousmane Dabo will be relieved to know Barton is doing most of his damage on Twitter

Joey Barton provides a prime example of how social media can be a double edged sword.

Days after his inconvenient truths about his club earned him the respect of thousands of fans from not just Newcastle but many others frustrated by the way clubs do business, he's gone and destroyed his whistle blower image to become another cheap aunt agony who unloads every thought shallow or otherwise on a ready audience.

The Colorado Rapids hold their collective breath while they await the injury diagnosis for star forward Conor Casey.

Casey is scheduled to undergo an MRI on Monday to determine the extent of the left calf/Achilles strain he suffered in the first half of Colorado's 4-3 loss at Seattle on Saturday afternoon.

The ongoing saga of how poorly the Revs' roster has been built continued this week, as oft-injured midfielder Ousemane Dabo announced his retirement on Monday.

The 34-year-old center half was limited to three appearances this season, and never stayed healthy long enough to make an impact on the Revolution's fortunes.

Mired in a nine game winless streak with no end in sight, the New England Revolution desperately need new players to turn their season around. And no one knows that more than head coach Steve Nicol.

Nicol knows his squad needs help. (Photo by Art Donahue/artdonahue.com)

"We need some new faces, which we're trying to do," said Nicol after Sunday's 3-0 loss to the Philadelphia Union.

The New England Revolution are set to take on English Premier League champions Manchester United on Wednesday night at Gillette Stadium as part of the World Football Challenge. This friendly comes smack in the middle of an extended run of poor form for the Revs but shouldn't throw too much of a wrench in their fixture schedule as it will be 9 days since their previous match against Real Salt Lake.

The New England Revolution will make an arduous Independence Day trip to Utah to take on Real Salt Lake at Rio Tinto Stadium on Monday. The Revs are winless in their last seven matches, going all the way back to a 1-0 home victory against Vancouver on May 14th. RSL, on the other hand, are starting to come out of a rough patch after beginning the season on fire but losing momentum due to injuries and Gold Cup absences.

The New England Revolution will take on the Seattle Sounders on Sunday afternoon in the first match of an extended road trip. Seattle has been up and down this season but appear to be getting their house in order and they still sit pretty at third in the Western Conference. The Revs will have to try and fight for all the points they can get after coming up with just two points in their recent two-match home stand.

Missed opportunities and miscommunication in the attacking third continue to be the name of the game for the New England Revolution as they fail to get any points against a red hot FC Dallas team out in Frisco, TX.
The team saw the surprising return of their consistently injured Frenchmen, Didier Domi and Ousmane Dabo, as they made their way to Nicol's starting XI.

FRISCO, Tex. For the second consecutive week, the Revs were kept off the board as they fell to FC Dallas Saturday night at Pizza Hut Park.

Martin Chavez scored in the 69th minute while Kevin Hartman was rarely tested in the course of recording his seventh clean sheet of the season.

Even with Ousmane Dabo and Didier Domi back in action, the Revs failed to assert themselves on the ball early.

On the one hand, the New England Revolution will have to look at last night's result as two points lost. The Colorado Rapids side that met the Revs at Gillette were not the MLS Cup Champion Rapids; they were horribly depleted by injuries and playing their third match in seven days. Especially with Conor Casey and Omar Cumming missing it appeared the perfect opportunity for New England to pick up a valuable win against one of the league's class sides, and they failed to do that.

The New England Revolution held on for a gutsy 3-2 win over D.C. United in the U.S. Open Cup play-in match last night. The Revs will now travel to face Sporting Kansas City with a spot in the formal U.S. Open Cup bracket on the line.

With two goals from Kheli Dube and one from Alan Koger, New England took a 3-0 lead after 69 minutes, and then had to hold on for dear life as D.

Viva Las Vegas!

I know none (or at least not many) of you are in Las Vegas right now, but I am! As such, my work this week will probably be a tad abridged. Like this opening preamble to the game thread.

Ousmane Dabo, Rajko Lekic and Pat Phelan are listed as probable for tonight's match.

According to a tweet from Kyle J. McCarthy, MLS has sent out an email confirming that the New England Revolution selected Benny Feilhaber with their spot in the allocation order.

Proponents of #BringBennyToBoston (myself included) are not out of the woods yet, however; several teams are apparently phoning the Revolution FO right now for trade discussions.

It looked like a depleted New England Revolution side was going to get out of Houston with a draw until Hunter Freeman's 86th minute goal broke the Revolution's resolve and handed the Houston Dynamo a 1-0 win.

It was the Revs' second consecutive shutout loss after starting the season unbeaten through four games, while it was also their first-ever loss in Houston after five previous successful visits.

Alan Pardew has no issues at all with Joey Barton, and he thinks that Joey deserves to be the Newcastle captain in the absence of Kevin Nolan, tomorrow afternoon at Villa Park. Joey Barton - in action at Stoke Joey has made some controversial comments about both Gareth Barry and Ousmane Dabo over the last [.

Sorry I'm late, Sunday was a little hectic.

I hope none of you are satisfied with Saturday's performance. One point is better than none, certainly, but an expansion team on a long road trip that has conceded five goals in their last two league matches should be easy pickings for a club looking to be a playoff contender.

Clint Dempsey scored his sixth goal of the season on Tuesday to help Fulham climb out of the relegation zone with a 3-0 win against West Bromwich Albion.

Fulham jumped all the way to 13th in the English Premier League standings with the win. Dempsey's goal made the score 2-0, with defender Brede Hangeland added an insurance goal to make the score 3-0.