Cincinnati hosts red-hot New England, with tight favoritism and goals expected on both sides

Ten points separate FC Cincinnati and New England Revolution in the Eastern Conference right now, but TQL Stadium tends to even things out whenever these two meet. The hosts sit ninth, the visitors fourth, and both sides need points as the MLS season heads into its final stretch.

Cincinnati still hasn't found its footing: so far this season the club has posted 9 wins, 9 draws and 9 losses in 27 matches, with 58 goals scored and 65 allowed, a negative differential that explains much of its standing. Over the last five games, Pat Noonan's side has won just once, with two draws and two losses mixed in; in fact the team enters this match off a loss and two draws before snapping that run with a win. Playing at home in MLS this season (a sample of 12 matches), Cincinnati averages 2.835 goals scored and 2.003 allowed per game, with just 17% clean sheets, and tends to be most dangerous between the 76th and 90th minutes. Kévin Denkey leads that sample with 16 goals, followed by Evander with 13.

New England, meanwhile, sits fourth in the standings with 14 wins, 4 draws and 10 losses in 28 matches, 45 goals scored and 39 allowed. The recent form looks more encouraging on paper: three wins and two losses in the last five, though those two losses are the most recent results. Playing on the road in MLS this season (14 matches in the sample), Marko Mitrovic's team averages 1.36 goals scored and 1.64 allowed, with just 7% clean sheets, and tends to score most often between the 31st and 45th minutes. Carles Gil leads that sample with 12 goals, followed by Dor Turgeman and Peyton Miller with 7 each.

What the head-to-head says

The two sides have met 8 times: 3 wins for Cincinnati, 3 draws and 2 for New England, with 11 goals from the home side and 14 from the away side across that history. Even on results, but with a tendency toward open scorelines.

Projected lineups

For Cincinnati, the projected lineup (medium reliability) has Roman Celentano in goal, Miles Robinson and Nick Hagglund at the back, and a midfield of Obinna Nwobodo, Pavel Bucha, Gerardo Valenzuela and Evander, supporting Kévin Denkey and Tom Barlow up top.

New England, with a high reliability projected lineup, would go with Matt Turner between the posts, a back four of Matt Polster, Will Sands, Ethan Kohler and Mamadou Fofana, Carles Gil as the offensive engine alongside Brooklyn Raines, Jackson Yueill and Dániel Gazdag, with Peyton Miller and Dor Turgeman up front.

Match probabilities

Our model gives Cincinnati a bit of an edge for playing at home, but the Revolution's 30% and the 22% draw probability make clear nothing is settled beforehand. This is our own estimate drawn from the season's trends, not a betting line or a definitive forecast. The expected goals numbers back that up too: 2.24 for the home side against 1.76 for the visitors, a combined total of 4 that points toward an open match. The broader trends support that read as well: 73% probability of more than 2.5 goals and 72% probability of both teams scoring.

With that mix of numbers, the logical expectation is a back and forth match at TQL Stadium, where neither the standings nor recent history guarantee anything on their own.