Real Salt Lake won their home game 1-0 with MLS Player of the Week Robbie Findley scoring in the 88th minute. “We’ve been talking about it all week, that this home game was going to be our chance to get out on top and we were able to get a goal. Now we’ve got to go over there for a tough game, a hard-fought game, but we’ve just got to leave it all on the field.”
Columbus matched Salt Lake's total for shots on goal at two, making it a relatively easy shutout for RSL keeper Nick Rimando. Both teams finished with two corners, with RSL taking the lead on fouls 15 to 11.
As for both teams' display of negative soccer, Columbus coach Robert Warzycha deflected any notion that the Crew's game plan was more about RSL not scoring than scoring themselves. “You always go into the game to score goals," he said. "I mean, you can’t tell the players not to score goals. But sometimes you don’t create chances, and that’s what happened today. They have a good team, they played at home and they had the momentum after winning last week. It was very important for us to not give up a goal, so with a 0-0 tie we’d probably be very happy.”
Fortunately for MLS, this game wasn't easily available on National television and few paying customers saw it. 11,499 was the announced attendance, with the populace of the greater Salt Lake area reminding the League that kids will normally choose trick-or-treating over professional soccer.
