New York Red Bulls vs. Benfica: Score, Grades and Reaction from 2015 ICC

The New York Red Bulls earned a 2-1 victory at home in the 2015 International Champions Cup against Benfica on Sunday night.

This is New York's second win over a European power in less than a week, which the New York Times' Andrew Das joked should get the team into Europe's premier competition:

Despite this preseason match coming right in the middle of the Major League Soccer season, New York included a handful of regular first-teamers in its lineup Sunday night. Plus, the Red Bulls' 4-2 win over Chelsea—where they fielded what was essentially a reserve team—illustrated Benfica couldn't afford to take the MLS side lightly.       

Sixteen-year-old Tyler Adams was among those on the pitch for the Red Bulls in that victory. After the match, he admitted he wasn't at all surprised he and his teammates gave the reigning Premier League champions such a difficult go of it.

"We all played as hard as we possibly could," Adams said in the post-match press conference, per NewYorkRedBulls.com. "We made it tougher on them at times as well. As long as you're making it tough on guys like that, it's hard to score and that's what we did."

New York couldn't afford to rest on its laurels, going up against the reigning Portuguese champions. In addition, Benfica wouldn't be taking the Red Bulls lightly after the way they decimated Chelsea in the second half.

Pizzi made that emphatically clear with his goal in the seventh minute. A Red bulls defender blocked Nelsinho's shot. The ball fell to the feet of Pizzi, who executed a perfect one-two with Mehdi Carcela-Gonzalez before running through on goal. Luis Robles was helpless to stop the goal.

Benfica nearly made it 2-0 a little later, but Robles stepped up to stonewall Jonathan Rodriguez and Adel Taarabt in succession, per Jason Baum, the Red Bulls' senior director of communications:

In the 34th minute, New York equalized after a terrible error from Luisao. Standing close to his own goal, the Benfica center back seemed caught in two minds as he received a pass. His touch wasn't heavy enough to reach his goalkeeper and instead allowed Bradley Wright-Phillips a gilt-edged opportunity to score.

As Chris Ryan of NJ Advance Media posited, the goal was essentially a tap-in for a finisher the quality of Wright-Phillips:

New York posted an up-close look at the goal on Twitter:

The Red Bulls nearly returned the favor in the 45th minute. Karl Ouimette passed back to Robles, who picked up the ball with his hands. The referee spotted the indiscretion and whistled for an indirect free kick roughly six yards from goal.

Seemingly every New York player on the pitch lined up on the goal line to make things difficult for Benfica on the set piece. Andreas Samaris laid the ball off to Pizzi, whose shot was blocked by Dax McCarty. Taarabt's rebound opportunity was blocked as well, and the Red Bulls expelled the danger, per Ray Curren of the Equalizer:

That was the last action of the first half, with the two teams entering the locker rooms tied at 1-1.

Before Benfica could regain their footing in the second half, they were already staring at a 2-1 deficit.

In the 56th minute, Mike Grella curled a perfect chip into the top left corner of the goal. It was a genuine moment of brilliance from the Red Bulls midfielder, who gave Ederson Moraes no chance to make the save.

Former Red Bulls manager Mike Petke praised the goal from Grella:

Going down forced Benfica to push a little higher up the field in search of a goal. It enjoyed the lion's share of possession for the remainder of the match, but it couldn't turn that into consistent goalscoring opportunities.

Benfica finished with 22 total shots but only got eight of those on goal.

Rui Vitoria made a number of second-half substitutions, which also caused the Portuguese giants to become a bit disjointed in possession.

In the end, they suffered their third defeat of the International Champions Cup. They'll look to rebound against Club America on Tuesday in Mexico City. For Vitoria, getting the players back to match fitness and accustomed to his style will be more important than the results themselves.

The Red Bulls' participation in the ICC is officially over, so they'll focus all of their attention to their MLS campaign. They hit the road next Saturday to take on the Philadelphia Union.

Selected Player Grades

Mike Grella, New York Red Bulls: B

Grella didn't have a ton of opportunities to grab the game by the scruff of the neck with Benfica generally enjoying possession. When he did have the slightest of windows with which to score, he took full advantage.

His curling floater into the top corner is one of the better goals you'll see all weekend.

Luisao, Benfica: C

Admittedly, Luisao didn't do a whole lot wrong on the night, but his biggest mistake ended up costing his club dearly. As experienced as he is, he simply can't be handing the opposition golden opportunities to score. He wasn't under a ton of pressure either, which made his decision to pass back to the goalkeeper all the more puzzling.    

Bleacher Report is Official Media Partner of the International Champions Cup North America.