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SANDY — After Real Salt Lake clinched its seventh straight MLS Cup playoff appearance with a 2-0 win over San Jose, the Salt Lake side didn’t feel a need to let up.
Quite the contrary.
RSL turns its attention to its final road match of the regular season with a Portland Timbers team fighting for its postseason life. The Timbers are one point behind Vancouver for the fifth seed out of the Western Conference, something that makes the final two weeks of the season must-win territory for the Pacific Northwest side.
“It’s another team with their back against the wall, and those teams are always hard to play against,” said RSL coach Jeff Cassar, who sported a new shaved haircut following the team’s playoff clincher. “But if we come out and push them from the start, that could play into our hands.”
RSL still has plenty to play for because the team is locked in a back-and-forth battle with FC Dallas to stay in third place and out of the first-round play-in match to start the postseason.
“I just hope we can keep moving forward,” defender Chris Wingert said. “We don’t want to look back too much. You always want to try to correct a few things. But we know that we’ve got two big games left, and then the postseason. Right now, our focus is on trying to earn as many points as we can and clinch that third spot.”
Friday night’s match from Providence Park in Portland will kick at 8 p.m. MT on the NBC Sports Network and provides an opportunity to get RSL into playoff mode, Cassar said.
“I thought we had the right mentality (against San Jose), coming out and being aggressive,” he added. “We’re going to use these next two games to really get ourselves in that playoff mindset. It’s going to Portland, being organized, hard to break down and putting away our chances when we get them.”
Salt Lake also welcomes back first-rate goalkeeper Nick Rimando, who played a half in the U.S. Men’s National Team’s 1-1 draw with Honduras on Tuesday, as well as top scorers Joao Plata of Ecuador and Alvaro Saborio of Costa Rica.
“Those guys are very important for us,” midfielder Javier Morales said. “They are doing good for their national teams, and now coming in for us, they will be huge to get back.”
The Timbers lost midfield standout Will Johnson two weeks ago to a gruesome broken leg, but RSL knows the offensive power of Diego Valeri and the rest of Portland.
“They still have a lot of firepower,” Wingert said. “Both them and Vancouver have been really good at getting the maximum amount of points the last two weeks.”
