Real Salt Lake walked away the victor in their matchup against new Western conference rival Sporting Kansas City Wednesday evening, nabbing a 2-1 victory in the Desert Diamond Cup tournament’s semi-final matchup thanks to goal scorers Emery Welshman (12’) and Devon Sandoval (47’), as well as a gritty performance from backup keeper Jeff Attinella in the waning moments of the match.
Real Salt Lake and Sporting Kansas City: MLS’ best new rivalry
This matchup, like every other occasion these two clubs take to the pitch against one another, was a brutally physical affair that featured more than a few distasteful exchanges between players from both sides.
The bad blood between the two clubs began way back in the preseason of 2011, in the very same Desert Diamond Cup tournament that they faced off in earlier in the week. Another physical preseason match turned into anarchy when a bench clearing brawl erupted after a hard tackle on RSL’s Javier Morales with studs up courtesy of Sporting’s Roger Espinoza. After the players had dispersed, RSL head coach Jason Kreis decided to pull his team off of the field and abandon the remainder of the match.
Fast-forward to July 2013, the leagues’ two best teams in RSL and Sporting KC met up in a regular season clash at Rio Tinto Stadium in Salt Lake City. The echo of the opening whistle had barely disappeared before RSL defender Chris Wingert was shown a yellow card for a hard elbow to the neck area of a Sporting KC player. Although Sporting’s coach Peter Vermes’ pleas for a straight red were ignored, he eventually got his wish when Wingert was sent off for a second yellow early in the second half.
The match came down to the wire with both teams level at one goal apiece heading into stoppage time. After the 5+ minutes of stoppage time had elapsed, Sporting KC were in possession in an advantageous position and referee Matthew Foerster decided to let play continue for an additional 2+ minutes – Sporting scored the winning goal on a Ike Opara header in the 97th minute. The scene at the stadium turned ugly as some of Sporting’s players came toward the supporters in a taunting manner and the RSL fans in turn began to throw garbage and other objects onto the field.
Fast-forward again to December, 2013. RSL and Sporting KC met up in the MLS Cup final held at a freezing Sporting Park in Kansas City. After playing to a 1-1 draw during the 90+ minutes regular time and 30+ minutes of added time, the two clubs had no choice but to resort to the penalty shootout to decide the 2013 playoff champion. RSL fans are still haunted by the vision of Sebastian Velasquez’s blocked spot kick that would have won the title, followed by Lovel Palmer’s miss that secured the MLS Cup for Sporting KC.
Finally, April of 2014 – after RSL and Sporting KC had played to a 0-0 draw in an early regular season matchup (thanks in large part to the brilliant goal keeping of Jeff Attinella in place of an injured Nick Rimando), Sporting forward Dom Dwyer took to Twitter to let the world know about his feelings towards RSL.
“I hate them very much.”
After that tweet, Dwyer and Rimando shared some choice words to each other via Twitter as both supporter groups collected more fuel to fire the fresh rivalry.
Thanks to the new conference alignments, RSL and Sporting KC are now both in the MLS Western Conference. The league will be blessed with two RSL vs. Sporting KC matches a year, let alone any future playoff encounters that are sure to arise with both teams contending for two of the six playoff spots.
Here’s to hoping that both clubs do indeed make the playoffs and meet up sometime before MLS Cup, because the only thing needed to push this unfriendly affair into full on “rivalry mode” is a hard-fought aggregate playoff matchup.
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