Penalty kicks are rising, but RSL players focus on Montreal


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SANDY — It’s no secret that a set piece can change the course of a soccer match, whether that comes in gained momentum with a goal or a great save, or by providing the needed offensive firepower for a team struggling to convert its scoring chances.

In Major League Soccer, match officials have apparently taken notice. The league’s 19 teams have accumulated as many penalty kicks through July 2014 as they did in the entire 2013 season.

RSL coaches and players say they can’t control a referee’s decision, but they can control how they react to them.

“All we want as players is consistency,” said RSL goalkeeper Nick Rimando, who boasts an all-time (and MLS-best) 34 percent PK save rate. “If you’re going to call an easy tackle or an easy play a foul, then do it both ways.”

Rimando has a 75 percent PK save rate in 2014 for a team that has seen seven PK calls go against it with six in favor. The veteran goalkeeper will be aiming for his all-time MLS record 112th shutout when RSL hosts Montreal at 8 p.m. MT Thursday.

RSL saw a penalty kick go against it last week in a 1-1 draw against Vancouver. The Salt Lake side has seen 13 goals through 18 matches, or 0.68 penalties per game. MLS’s average is 0.49 penalties per game — a number that has increased 69 percent since last year.

Since the league’s founding in 1996, the all-time league average is 0.29 penalties per game.

Some could argue that MLS’s recent focus on melees in the penalty area has led to its officials being more cognizant of what has grown to be a physical league.

“I know they have been focusing on six seconds with the goalie having the ball in his hands, and no wrapping or wrestling on corner kicks,” RSL captain Kyle Beckerman said. “But I don’t know if that’s a reason for more PKs. You just hope you’re on the positive side of it, and you aren’t always making (the fouls inducing a PK).”

That was Jeff Cassar’s response, too. The first-year head coach has repeatedly said he wants his players to take the game away from a referee’s critical decision.

“I’m really just concerned about continually putting our guys in the right positions,” Cassar said. “I have 110 percent confidence that the more and more they get into those, it’ll start flowing for them.”

RSL midfielder Ned Grabavoy, who recently returned to the starting lineup after a hip injury, echoed his head coach. He said he isn’t surprised by the rise in penalty kicks given, because it just reinforces something league officials focused on at the beginning of the season.

“We need to focus on ourselves and keep doing what we’re doing,” said Grabavoy, who is “moving quickly” toward 100 percent fitness and recovery. “But at the end of the day, we have to give ourselves some chances in front of goal and finish some of them.”

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