Bruce Arena: NYCFC the best team we've played this year

Bruce Arena didn't mince words after his team's 2-0 home defeat to New York City FC in Week 9. 

At his postgame press conference, the New England Revolution coach said his team was "thoroughly outplayed" over the course of the 90 minutes against the Cityzens, as the defeat dropped the Revs to 2W-2L-5D on the season.

"I think every player lost their matchup tonight," Arena said. "I don’t have a high evaluation. Just in general, I thought Diego Fagundez played well for us tonight. [Tommy] McNamara was fine for the minutes he played. I thought he was going to fatigue and I think he did. Yeah, [Matt] Turner did everything he needed to do. Nothing he could do there. And [Michael] Mancienne was solid, but I think on the night, all the other positions on the field, we were outplayed. Give them a lot of credit. They were certainly the better team.”

In terms of the notion of his team being out-competed, Arena said in this case it was more about New York City FC showing its quality on the day than any sort of long-term pattern he's noticed within his group. Arena said the Cityzens were the strongest opponent his group has faced, but that it's on his Revolution to address the issues that led to the poor result.

"We had a very poor start against [New York] Red Bull as well, but New York City [FC] is probably the best team we’ve played this year and they showed it on the night," Arena said. "We weren’t up to their quality and the way they battled. I was very disappointed in our physical performance, in the fact that we were out-competed in a number of positions.