SALT LAKE CITY - Real Salt Lake, sans Adu, fell to the New England Revolution 2-1 Saturday night in Salt Lake City, dropping their first match of the second half of league play.

Despite the news of losing U-20 standout Freddy Adu to Benfica just hours before game time, RSL seemed to fair well against the MLS powerhouse early in the game, matching feet with New England beat for beat.

RSL, who hoped to take advantage of some newly-found confidence gained during preseason friendlies, just couldn't quite match the 90 plus minutes of play constructed by the Eastern Conference leading Revolution.

"We felt everything was good, and we really thought we would come out here and put on a good showing and get a win," midfielder Kyle Beckerman said.

"Tonight we weren't good enough, and we just need to work harder and hopefully get it done and be good enough next week."

RSL opened with several well-earned opportunities on the offensive end, putting up three shots, however, none of which found the goal. RSL also earned the first corner of the night after a strong push from Beckerman.

The momentum seemingly began to shift toward New England midway through the half, as RSL keeper Nick Rimando was forced to earn his keep, and it wasn't long before they had their backs against the wall.

The Rev’s strung together a run of offensive opportunities, starting with a rip from forward Pat Noonan driving down the right side, forcing Rimando to make an honorable diving save to his right to deflect it wide.

New England continued their push, putting up five corner kicks within minutes of one another, and they again put Rimando on the spot when he made a big play on midfielder Andy Dorman's shot in the 32nd minute.

New England’s offensive barrage proved to be too much for RSL in the 39th minute, when Noonan found the back of the net after two great looks from teammates Jeff Larentowicz and Taylor Twellman to set up the shot.

Noonan caught up with Twellman's header down field as he broke through the RSL defense, finding himself on the doorstep, one-on-one with Rimando. Without hesitation, Noonan connected to put up the first mark of the match.

The first half ended 1-0, with the stats highly favoring New England. The Rev's broke from play having taken four shots, all of them on net, while earning five corners. On the flip side, RSL managed only three shots, with zero on net with only one corner.

Play commenced in nearly the same fashion it had ended; with RSL fending off New England’s heavy offense, but RSL soon regained composure, creating chance after chance as play continued in the half.

"I think we were a bit sluggish in the first half," Carey Talley said, "but we brought it back in the second and got our legs back under us."

In the 52nd minute of play it looked like RSL midfielder Kyle Beckerman might have had a chance, coming off a feed from Robbie Findley, but he couldn't catch up before GK Matt Reis made a play for the ball.

RSL continued their effort in the 56th minute, when Findley drove hard down the left side, drawing double coverage. He quickly fed to the middle, but Chris Brown was out of reach to take a shot.

New England nearly exteneded their lead in the 65th minute when a shot off the foot of midfielder Khano Smith deflected off the crossbar.

RSL continued creating, without any succes, and to make matters worse, in the 67th minute RSL forward Andy Williams was dealt a red card after a hard sliding foul on Dorman as he went up to receive the ball.

Despite Williams removal RSL's battle for offensive possession payed dividends in the 71st minute, when forward Kyle Brown worked his way down field, setting Beckerman up for a drive up the middle. Beckerman was taken down hard in the box, earning a PK.

Talley stepped up to take the shot for RSL, and managed to drive it low and to the left, beating Reis.

But the glory was short-lived; Talley was issued a foul just outside the box on RSL's defensive end on a somewhat questionable call by the officials; the call resulted in a New England goal off the free kick by Larentowicz, putting them up 2-1 just 10 minutes after RSL had equalized.

"We got a bit unlucky, but we can't just look at that as the reason that we lost," Talley said. "There were other things that led to it, and we just got to get better."

RSL put forth a desperate effort in the remaining minutes, earning a free kick in added time, but again struggled to finish; Talley's kick narrowly missed, going wide left.

"It's unacceptable to lose at home." Beckerman said. "It's not something we can get used to."

Scoring
NE - Pat Noonan, 4 (Taylor Twellman, 2, Jeff Larentowicz,3) 39'
RSL - Carey Talley, 1 (penalty kick) 72'
NER- Jeff Larentowicz, 2 (unassisted) 82'

Line-ups
NE - Matt Reis, Jay Heaps, Michael Parkhurst, James Riley, Steve Ralston, Andy Dorman, Shalrie Joseph, Jeff Larentowicz, Wells Thompson (Khano Smith, 59'), Taylor Twellman, Pat Noonan.

RSL - Nick Rimando, Jean-Martial Kipre, Ritchie Kotschau, Eddie Pope, Chris Wingert, Kyle Beckerman, Nathan Sturgis (Jamie Watson, 70'), Carey Talley, Andy Williams, Robbie Findley (Atiba Harris, 73'), Chris Brown (Kyle Brown, 61')