When Real Salt Lake finished off their preseason in Norman, Okla. last weekend, they did not see an impending matchup with Kansas City Wizards as any old exhibition game.
For RSL, going against the Wizards in the 2008 Saturn Challenge Cup was essentially a preview for the season opener. One last chance to get everything tuned up.
"We see it sort of as the last piece of the preseason," coach Jason Kreis said, before the team departed for Oklahoma. "A lot of other games we've been going through have just been exercises for us. This is basically going to be a dry run for the first game of the season. We're looking at this as the culmination of a lot of hard work in our preseason."
RSL closed the preseason with a 1-0 setback to Kansas City which, on the surface, seemed uncomfortably familiar. Real saw several scoring opportunities turn into near-misses which eventually brought on the shutout loss.
Andy Williams could not connect on a cross from Javier Morales in the 24th minute, with his shot sailing just inches wide of the left post. Williams also missed on a long bomb in the 42nd minute that landed outside of the right post.
RSL had a few more chances in the final minutes, but shots from Tino Nunez, Dema Kovalenko and Yura Movsisyan all sailed over the crossbar -- with Nunez's shot actually landing on top of the net itself.
A positive from the loss is RSL showed an ability attack the goal in the later stages of the second half against the Wizards. With improved finishing, RSL could turn itself into a formidable late game team.
And with the Chicago Fire awaiting in Saturday's season opener, fine-tuning a new look offense to seize any such advantage will be a priority.
"We want to sharpen up our play now," Movsisyan said. "We've done all our hard work. Now we want to put it into playing."
One thing not an issue so far is team chemistry. Many of the team's high-profile acquisitions have praised Kreis and his system. RSL seems content to work hard and not worry about the future beyond the next game.
Such an attitude wasn't always a given in the past.
"We're buying into the system that the coaching staff has given us and we all believe in it," midfielder Kyle Beckerman said. "We just hope all this hard work is going to pay off in the end."
The preseason trip to Argentina helped a great deal in putting a mixture of new players and holdovers from last season together in an environment where they had no choice but to spend time together.
Once in Argentina, training and game play reached a higher level than it had in earlier preseason camps as players bonded on and off the field.
"All the guys took a massive step forward in the right direction there," defender Ian Joy said. "It's been a great bonus for all of us to be together all this time."
What happens against Chicago could be a good barometer for how long the increased confidence and cohesiveness will last. A victory at home would provide an additional boost to what Kreis has spent an entire preseason preaching to his team.
RSL is taking a cautious approach. The players and coaches aren't declaring themselves the newest contender on the MLS block and making predictions on matters like victory totals and playoff seeding. They are simply looking to play better soccer from one game to the next.
"We can't really make any predictions or anything," Beckerman said. "We don't really believe in that right now. But we feel like we're doing the right things in practice."
John Coon is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
