Real Salt Lake hopes for non-boring rematch

WASHINGTON — Real Salt Lake coach Jason Kreis admits that Wednesday's U.S. Open Cup qualifying match with D.C. United was a bit boring.

"From what I saw last night it was two teams that didn't want to lose, playing very cautiously and not taking a lot of chances, and that can be a little bit boring, and it was for a lot of that game," he said.

In the league rematch with D.C. United on Saturday, Kreis doesn't expect the same.

"It's just going to be a different atmosphere. It's amazing what happens when you put people in the stands. That atmosphere changes, the game changes, the emotion of it all changes," said Kreis.

RSL hopes to be fresh enough to capitalize on the energy.

Many of the same players who slogged through 120 minutes of soccer in a humid RFK Stadium on Wednesday night figure to be in the starting lineup again on Saturday. Among them are Nat Borchers, Will Johnson, Robbie Russell and Tony Beltran.

Several others played upwards of 60 to 90 minutes, making fatigue a big concern for Kreis heading into Saturday's match.

The players went through a light pool workout Thursday morning but then most were given the rest of the day off before a team dinner with co-owner Dave Checketts in the evening. Kreis hopes everyone who played extended minutes Wednesday will be ready for Saturday, but he won't know for sure until the team practices later today following its morning White House visit.

"It's hard to get a gauge until we get them on the field and run, but there are no injuries and that's a good thing," said Kreis.

Regardless of fatigue, however, many of those players will have to forge ahead anyway. Robbie Findley is in South Africa gearing up for the World Cup, Kyle Beckerman is out with a foot injury and Chris Wingert, Andy Williams and Nelson Gonzalez are all questionable with hamstring injuries.

Kreis expects whatever players are on the field to be extra motivated after losing to D.C. United 2-1 in overtime Wednesday.

"I think our guys to be honest feel a little bit disappointed with what happened last night, so we have I think a little extra motivation to certainly not lose two games in a row to D.C.," said Kreis.

Looking back on the Open Cup qualifying loss, Russell doesn't think RSL played all that poorly and agrees with the assertion by his coach that the team is hungry.

"I thought we played pretty well. We had possession a lot of the time, kind of an interesting call for a penalty against us. I think fundamentally we played well," he said. "We had a little problem in the final third, getting that final pass, we were off by a couple inches over and over again, maybe that's what we need."

e-mail: jedward@desnews.com