Real Salt Lake has a very diverse locker room. Players hale from as far away as England, The Gambia and Argentina. But no matter where it is that you come from, when life hands you lemons, it can only mean it’s time to make lemonade.
RSL Head Coach Jeff Cassar learned that the axiom reaches across cultures when his team’s training was altered significantly by a snowstorm in Sandy on Tuesday morning. When Cassar asked his team what you make when life hands you lemons, Colombian defender Jamison Olave was first to bellow out “lemonade.”
“We thought we were going to be able to get it going outside,” Cassar said Tuesday after an impromptu indoor training session at Rio Tinto Stadium. “The crew here did everything they can. The snow was coming faster than we could get it cleared. And when they got it cleared it started piling up again, so we wouldn’t have had the quality that we wanted to.”
While the players were inconvenienced by the weather, they had a very genial reaction to seeing the snowfall after spending the majority of the last five weeks in Arizona and California for preseason training camp.
“I was actually excited. It’s been a while since I’ve been in a snowstorm because I missed the first one,” RSL captain Kyle Beckerman grinned. “I was happy waking up today. It did keep us from the field, so we had to do some other stuff, but it’s an ok thing.”
The players took the relocation and improvisation in stride, making the most of their situation.
“It is what it is,” Luis Gil shrugged. “You find a way to get that fitness in and enjoy ourselves still.”
For all the fun and games, RSL now has its full focus on preparing to face the Portland Timbers on Saturday at Providence Park in the season opener. Even with three key players in Washington, D.C., for Players Union meetings, as Nick Rimando, Chris Schuler and Tony Beltran are all scheduled to return to training on Thursday, the team remained intently keyed on the matchup with Portland.
The team will hold two more training sessions in Sandy – both scheduled for the training ground at America First Field – before departing for Portland. Saturday’s match kicks off at 8:30 p.m. MT on KMYU.
