I'm probably going to get called a bit of a homer for this one, so be it.
First off, great night for soccer at Rio Tinto Stadium last night. Game time temp was 88 degrees with a bit of a breeze. It really could have been a lot hotter. RSL came in relatively healthy for the first time in awhile. We're still missing Paulo Jr, Arnoux, and Javi. Paulo and Arnoux should hopefully be ready in a couple of weeks.
San Jose came in depleted though. Dawkins was out with an injury picked up against Vancouver on Wednesday, Lenhart was out on personal leave. Sealy started up front with Wondo. Neither of them were effective.
The first half was pretty much boring, crappy soccer. San Jose came out with some energy in the first 10 minutes, but never really troubled Nick Rimando. After that, they pretty much shutdown offensively for the rest of the match. That irked me, I had really been looking forward to seeing Wondo make some noise. RSL grabbed a couple of late chances, including a Beckerman shot just over the bar and a shot from Fabian Espindola that Busch made a great play on, but the first half ended at 0-0.
RSL came out well in the second half, and it was clear that the Quakes were just playing for a draw, and not doing a very good job. Borchers headed in a goal off of a corner that was ruled offside. We didn't like it in the stadium, but the replay showed it was the correct call. Then all hell broke loose.
Sabo took the ball into the area and got caught between Ring and Burling, and he went down with little contact. Burling was sent off and Sabo got a PK. Goal.com is going bonkers about this dive. Did Sabo dive? Yeah probably. Was it the wrong call? Yeah, probably. Does MLS officiating still suck? Yeah. You know what, RSL has been screwed over so much at home by short bus refs, I'm not going to cry over it. Sue me. Sabo hit the back of the net, scoreboard.
RSL added more goals from Sabo, Beckerman, and Olave to make the FT score 4-0. Jon Busch flipped off the ref and cursed him out, then went after Coah Kries after the match. Of course, like a little girl, he didn't stick around to let Jason respond.
All in all, we'll take the three points.
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