Real Salt Lake at the halfway point
June 24, 2008 by f4denz.
Well almost at the halfway point, we have completed 14 of our 30 MLS regular season matches for the 2008 season. It was just over one month ago that I gave out my player by player report card, and I will update those grade tomorrow, but today I will take a look at the numbers.
So if you compare the weeks from years past leading up to the midway point, you can see that clearly this is by far the best season in RSL history. With 19 points we are 7 points ahead of the 2005 and 2006 seasons, and 10 points ahead of last season.
If we look at the other numbers that often get tracked Goals For and Goals against, we will see similar trends:
At week 14 we have our lowest total of goals against in team history with 18, the closest year to that was 21 in 2006. We also see that RSL has scored more goals in the first 14 weeks than any other year in team history with 18, and once again the closest year is 2006 when we had 17 goals. What these number show is that the recent improvement in defense has mad a huge impact on our performance, when you have a even or positive goal differential you will get more points from your matches.
So if you look historically at RSL’s performance in the second half of the past seasons, in 2005 the worst year in RSL history we only scored 8 points in the last half of the season (that would be in 17 games), in 2006 we scored 26 points in the same time frame, in 2007 when we went to the current 30 game season we racked up 18 points in the last 15 matches.
The All Star break is 4 matches away, with two matches on the road and two at home and RSL will need to gather 6-7 points from those matches before the break. After the break RSL will have only 5 home matches, and with our performance on the road will have to improve if we want to make a solid effort at the playoffs this fall. Last year it took 40 points to make the playoffs in the first year of 30 matches, that means you needed to average 1.33 points from each game you play, and RSL is currently sitting at 1.35 so there can be no let up as that margin is very slim.
My prediction is that RSL will actually do better in the second half of the season than they have so far, a team with 20 new faces from the start of last season takes time to gel, almost every team in MLS will face players involved in international action (World Cup qualifying and the 2008 Olympics), but RSL has built in a lot of depth. As we have seen with injuries to Sturgis, is that Dema has stepped up, and even Kenny Cutler has shown the ability to step in and the overall quality doesn’t drop off as much as many teams that rely on a very small core of players. Fabian and Yura have been hurt in recent weeks and we have seen Robbie Findley step up, Kenny Deuchar still hasn’t caught on fire, but as we saw last weekend even Tino Nunez was able to step in and score against the best team in MLS. The defense has really stepped up and new players Jamison Olave and Nat Borchers have help RSL give up just one goal in their last 4 matches.
Everyone laughed at the start of the season when Greg Lalas picked RSL to finish 2nd in the West, when he stuck with that prediction a couple weeks ago people continued to laugh, well here we are almost at the halfway point of the season and in a very even Western Conference RSL is sitting alone where?
One other topic
So I have stated how displeased I am with the local coverage of RSL both in print and TV media, here is just the latest in a very long line of coverage that simply seems to be agenda based:
June 12th before the local primary elections and when RSL is struggling with just 12 points and near the bottom of the Western Conference here is the coverage of the progress at the stadium:
Sandy officials: RSL stadium won’t be ready for projected October opener by Rebecca Palmer in the Deseret News
The $110 million Real Soccer Stadium will host its first game Oct. 9, but city officials and project management say the structure won’t be completely finished in time.
Today June 24th, the primary polls are closed and the team has a 5 game undefeated streak and sits in second place in the Western Conference, here I today’s coverage from the same source:
Real Salt Lake stadium nears completion by Rebecca Palmer in the Deseret News
Coordinating construction of the Real Salt Lake stadium has been as complicated as orchestrating and conducting a symphony, said Layton-Turner Construction project manager Jake Greenland. But the effort has been a great opportunity, and the result will be a charming structure and a great community asset, he said.
So what changed? Did that much progress get made in just 12 days, or did something else change? Is it simply that the press has jumped on the RSL bandwagon this week? I am not sure but I have to say I am confused to say the least about how the coverage can vary so much in such a short time, I don’t expect it to last, since for the last several years the coverage has tainted to the negative.
OFF MY SOAPBOX