SALT LAKE CITY - It seems Real Salt Lake can only beat the best.
Both of RSL's victories this season have come against the top teams in the league. Saturday's win against Houston Dynamo was just the latest example; going into the match, the defending champions had the most points in the league standings. And Real's other win, a 2-1 result against D.C. United, ended a seven-game unbeaten streak by that club.
"It just shows that our team can play with the best," forward Robbie Findley said. Findley scored the game-winner on his 22nd birthday Saturday, and now has both of RSL's game-winners this season. "Any team can beat any team on any given day. You just have to put in the hard work during practice. Whatever you put into practice usually pays off during the game."
Real coach Jason Kreis has seen the effort in practice over the past several weeks.
"What we've really noticed as a staff is how much we've improved," Kreis said. "We see the work and the sweat and the tears that these guys are putting into the training field. You can see it on their faces that they believe in what's going on here."
In each of Real's first two seasons, the team seemed to struggle against mediocre sides only to come up with a surprise victory against the league's elite. In 2006, Real beat both D.C. United and FC Dallas at home; both victories seemed to come against all odds. And in 2005, two of Real's precious few victories came against some of the strongest sides in the league: the Los Angeles Galaxy on May 14 and FC Dallas on July 23.
Just as Real have seen improvement over the past few months, ever since Kreis took over as head coach and began a massive reconstruction effort, Houston's Richard Mulrooney saw a better team than one with a 2-9-6 record.
"I give full credit to Salt Lake. They have been jobbed by a couple calls this year. I don't think their record should have been one win before this," Mulrooney said. "They are a better team than that, and they showed it tonight, they can knock it around."
Just as rare as victories, Salt Lake scored a late-game goal when Findley struck in the 84th minute on Saturday. Real had allowed 10 goals in the final 15 minutes heading into the match, while Houston had not allowed any.
"It's definitely a relief because that hasn't happened for a while; something always seems to happen in the later part of the game," Real goalkeeper Nick Rimando said. "But today, we concentrated the whole 90 minutes. Everybody fought and to get a win tonight against one of the best teams in the league shows that we can play with the best; and when we do play good soccer and we concentrate, we can win games."
The win doubtless will do good things for Real's confidence. However, it might be difficult to build on the victory, considering Real's next game is on Aug. 18, two weeks after last Saturday's match.
"Now the key is to stay on track," defender Eddie Pope said. "We wish there was another game right away so we could build momentum, but we've just got to stay sharp over the next several days and go into the next game."
Peter Richins is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
