Real Salt Lake: Ellinger glad to see RSL get stadium

SANDY — John Ellinger admits that walking into Rio Tinto Stadium was a weird feeling on Saturday night.

He was Real Salt Lake's coach for over 2 1/2 years, and had a front row seat for the wild ride the organization went through to finally get the stadium funded. He's been in Dallas for the past year, though, and missed out on all of the excitement of the stadium construction.

Seeing the finished product for the first time was an exciting moment for the FC Dallas assistant coach.

"It's a beautiful complex," said Ellinger, who said the night would've been a lot weirder if the match were being played at Rice-Eccles Stadium. "It's fantastic to see the finished product. It's great for the league to have these soccer specific stadiums."

As for facing his old team, he said it was an interesting build-up to the match.

"There's always some animosity and excitement going back to the city where you used to be," he said. "There's no question that as we inched closer to this date there was some extra adrenaline, but I'm not playing."

It was no doubt a fun night for Ellinger, who chatted with old friends and various co-workers for over an hour leading up to the match.

The night didn't end well though for Ellinger, as FC Dallas was eliminated from playoff contention with the loss. He wasn't the only ex-RSLer who made their return Saturday. Jeff Cunningham started and played 90 minutes, while Jamie Watson played the final 11 minutes as a substitute.

IN RARE COMPANY: Real Salt Lake's Nick Rimando went the full 90 on Saturday night, meaning he's played in every minute of all 29 regular season matches this year. If he goes the full 90 next weekend at Colorado, he'll join an elite group of players.

In the 12-year history of MLS, only 29 players have played every minute of every regular season match. The following seven other players are close to reaching that plateau as well this year: Chicago's Jon Busch, Columbus' Brian Carroll and Will Hesmer, Kansas City's Jimmy Conrad and Kevin Hartman, New England's Jay Heaps and San Jose's Joe Cannon.

Assuming Rimando achieves the feat next week, this will be the second time he's done so in his career. Back in 2002, he started every match with D.C. United.

Nat Borchers would've also been on this list, but he was a late scratch Saturday night because of a neck strain. He had started the previous 28 matches for RSL.