Cosmos dominate Red Bulls, 3-0

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It’s a game that doesn’t happen often.

Two top soccer sides in New York playing against each other. It happened in a Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup fourth-round match between the New York Cosmos and the New York Red Bulls at Hofstra’s Shuart Stadium last Saturday night.

In a game that would bring local bragging rights to the victor and a spot in the next round of the competition, the New York Cosmos dominated en route to a 3-0 win against their cross-town rival before a jam-packed crowd of 9,364.

“Unbelievable, 3-0 against the Red Bulls is unbelievable,” Cosmos forward Alessandro Noselli said. “I don’t know in the future, but today maybe we are the best team in New York.”

The Cosmos grabbed a lead in quick fashion. Former Red Bulls defender, Carlos Mendes lofted a through ball towards forward Mads Stokkelien. After the ball took a few bounces, Stokkelien fired with his first touch into the far side upper corner.

The Red Bulls only managed to test Cosmos goalkeeper Jimmy Maurer once in the match in the 32nd minute from a Johnny Steele strike from inside the box. It was the only save Maurer had to make in the match.

The Cosmos continued to press and got their reward with Stokkelien finding the net for the second time in the 73rd minute. Danny Szetela played in a cross from the right, that Stokkelien again with is first touch found the back of the net.

“Today I felt like the other players made me good,” Stokkelien said. “They made me look good out there. The first was a good goal, but it was also a good pass from Carlos. The second goal was a great ball from Danny.”

Noselli was able to give the Cosmos a third goal five minutes later. Hunter Freeman’s long ball was chested into Noselli’s path by Stokkelien. Noselli took a touch around Red Bulls’ right back Chris Duvall to finish off a great performance from the Cosmos.

“I wanted to shoot with my right foot, but I watched the right back come toward me and I changed decision. It was a good decision for me,” Noselli said.

Several Red Bulls regulars were missing through injury or World Cup duty. Thierry Henry, Roy Miller and Tim Cahill were among the players not available. However, the Cosmos were missing their best player, Marcos Senna, who was out with an injury.

“Today was one of our best performances,” Cosmos coach Giovanni Savarese said. “I think today was a complete performance that was very, very good to see from the team.”

It came down to which team had more desire. The Red Bulls were unable to match the Cosmos intensity throughout the 90 minutes.

“We knew this was going to be like a World Cup game for them, and we knew they were going to come out and we were intending to match that, and they were better than us today,” Red Bulls midfielder Lloyd Sam said.

With the dominating victory, the Cosmos out-shot the Red Bulls 21-3, the quality of the NASL players on the pitch may have surprised the MLS club.

“I don’t think they were expecting so much from us, they didn’t know the talent we had in this team and the effort everybody fought to the end. Everybody was a gladiator,” said Cosmos forward Sebastian Guenzatti.