Real Salt Lake at Columbus Crew SC
May 28, 2016; 5 p.m. MT
MAPFRE Stadium
TV: KMYU (2.2 air / 12 satellite / 643 Comcast HD)
English Radio: ESPN 700 (6:30 p.m. MT)
Spanish Radio: 102.3 La Gran D FM / 1600 AM
Stream: MLS Live
Over the course of a 34-game MLS season, depth of teams is tested throughout.
Saturday marks the first match for Real Salt Lake while midfielder and captain Kyle Beckerman is away with the U.S. National Team for Copa America Centenario, which starts for the U.S. on June 3. Moreso than most years, though, RSL is equipped to handle the absence of its emotional leader.
With the addition of Sunday Stephen in the off-season and the continued seasoning of John Stertzer and Luke Mulholland in defensive midfield roles, Head Coach Jeff Cassar has more in his arsenal when it comes time to turn to his depth. Already this season, Beckerman has missed one match while serving a red card suspension. In that match, Stertzer stepped into his spot alongside Sunny and RSL put together a comprehensive performance in a 2-1 win over Sporting Kansas City back on April 2. Against Columbus Crew SC on Saturday, Cassar will look for a similar result.
“What I really like is it’s not one person filling the role. It’s the team. It’s being deep,” Cassar said this week. “We’re going to have to have everyone contributing and it’s been good so far.”
At 27 years old, Sunny is a veteran with worldly experience. He turned pro in 2005 and has played in Spain, Israel, Bulgaria and Turkey in addition to playing internationally for Spain at the youth level and Nigeria at the senior level. He wasted little time adjusting to a new locker room with Real Salt Lake nor a new league in MLS.
“Adding a guy like Sunny was huge for our depth. We’ve got to give Craig (Waibel) and the staff a lot of credit for that,” RSL defender Chris Wingert said. “We already had a great midfield and to add another piece like that – I don’t think many people knew who Sunny was and to come in and have the impact he’s had and give us that much more depth has been massive.”
While Real Salt Lake is missing just one player, albeit a very important one, Crew SC Head Coach Gregg Berhalter has holes to fill throughout his lineup. Already looking to fill the scoring void left by the departure of Kei Kamara, Columbus lost defender Gaston Sauro to injury last week and defender Harrison Afful and midfielder Cedric Mabwati to international duty. While the defending Eastern Conference champions have the talent to fill those vacant spots, it hasn’t shown itself in the standings, where Columbus is ninth in the East at 2-4-5.
“They’re a very well-coached team with Berhalter so we have to have a ton of respect for them,” Cassar said. “They have a ton of talent on their team. They are similar to Kansas City where they really send their outside backs into the attack. Higuain is a player that has a lot of freedom to go find the game. So we have to be defensively sound. It’s another team that we think we can get at and the chances will show themselves and it’s what we do with them.”
Kickoff on Saturday is scheduled for 5 p.m. MT.
