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ATLANTA — Real Salt Lake is in a funk.
There’s no easy way to say it. No way to sugarcoat it. No way to wax poetic about the team’s positives and negatives.
And that’s precisely how head coach Jeff Cassar felt following the team’s 2-1 loss to the second-division Atlanta Silverbacks on Saturday evening in its first match of the 2014 U.S. Open Cup.
“I don’t think anybody played well tonight,” Cassar told reporters bluntly following the match. “I don’t think anybody played well at all. I got outcoached, we got outplayed and there’s no positives at all from this game.”
Just like last Saturday against Portland, RSL again struck first via Robbie Findley’s goal in the 10th minute in front of a sold-out crowd of 5,000 at Silverbacks Park. The forward from Phoenix, Arizona, made his first start in 2014 after offseason knee surgery following the team’s MLS Cup final run.
But almost as quickly as the visitors looked to be on their way to another tournament run after last year’s U.S. Open Cup final appearance, RSL fell back. The Silverbacks’ Junior Burgos scored in the 33rd minute, and the two teams held the gridlock — in large part due to RSL goalkeeper Jeff Attinella’s heroics — for the remainder of regulation.
Then, almost two minutes into added time, Atlanta’s Kwadwo Poku got his chance, slicing a goal by RSL defenders Aaron Maund and Carlos Salcedo that slipped past Attinella.
I don't think anybody played well tonight. I don't think anybody played well at all. I got outcoached, we got outplayed and there's no positives at all from this game.
–Jeff Cassar, RSL head coach
And that was that.
There would be no Open Cup repeat in Salt Lake City.
“They were pushing numbers forward and putting us under it a little bit and we didn’t do a great job dealing with it,” said RSL defender Chris Wingert, who donned the captain’s armband Saturday. “We’ve had a rough couple weeks, but we just have to try to keep improving and get back after it as we get back into our MLS schedule at the end of the month.”
It was RSL’s third loss to a lower-division opponent in Open Cup history and first against a team from outside the state of Minnesota. RSL was without regulars Kyle Beckerman and Nick Rimando, who are in Brazil with the U.S. men’s national team, as well as Alvaro Saborio, Nat Borchers, Chris Schuler, Javier Morales and Ned Grabavoy for a variety of reasons.
The club also handed the second start of his MLS career to midfielder John Stertzer, and Sebastian Velasquez featured into his first gameday roster since a 2-1 win over Colorado on May 17. The latter entered the match in the 63rd minute for Luis Gil, who played atop RSL’s trademark midfield diamond.
But Cassar isn’t making any excuses, especially after taking the early lead.
“We started great and then we went away from what we were doing and they gained control of the game,” the first-year head coach said. “They played with more energy, more passion, like they were fighting for their jobs.”
The sentiment also crept into his players.
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Second-division Silverbacks again await RSL in US Open Cup
RSL (6-2-7 in MLS play) returns to play Saturday to take on the Atlanta Silverbacks at 6 p.m. MT at Atlanta Silverbacks Park.“You can see it in the locker room,” midfielder Luke Mulholland said. “All the guys’ heads are down, disappointed in ourselves, disappointed in the team and feel like we left Jeff (Cassar) down. It was difficult tonight. We got the first goal after a great run by Findley, but as soon as we got that goal, we stopped doing what we had been doing.”
RSL’s loss was the first of three for MLS clubs Saturday. The New York Red Bulls lost a crosstown derby match to the Long Island-based New York Cosmos, 3-0, and Chivas USA were bounced from the Open Cup in a penalty shootout with the Carolina RailHawks.
RSL can now take two weeks off to enjoy MLS’s World Cup break, with the next match June 28 at Chivas. It will be a time to re-focus and recharge — and also think about a four-game winless streak that immediately followed a bright, 12-match unbeaten run.
“We know what we need to do,” Mulholland said. “We don’t need to focus on the Open Cup anymore; we just need to focus on MLS and making sure that we get ourselves in a good position for the playoffs. It’s time to reassess ourselves, take a few days off, come back in with recharged batteries, cleared heads and really just have a really good push at it again like we did in the start of the season.” Contributing: Rod Zundel
