Real Salt Lake's Alvaro Saborio named MLS player of the week

I almost thought it wouldn't happen, but 11 of the 16 votes cast were for Alvaro Saborio, and the two who put Steve Zakuani as their 2nd choice just for walking on the pitch, well there are nuts in every batch. It is hard to believe that Sabo is the first RSL player to win player of the week honors.

I have to believe in addition to his hat trick on Saturday, that most of the voters saw the highlight of his being robbed of a goal on Wednesday. Still it was an impressive effort from Sabo who's first goal really was a thing of beauty, not often does a player get a header to cross the entire face of goal and find its way past defenders and the keeper. The second was a perfectly timed run to head a long distance cross past Troy Perkins. The final goal came on a PK but had Diego Chara not used his hand to stop the ball from crossing the line it would have been a 3^rd header goal of the night for Saborio off a great corner kick delivery by Javier Morales.

Here is the official press release from MLS Soccer:

Real Salt Lake's Álvaro Saborío Voted MLS Player of the Week

NEW YORK (Monday, July 9, 2012) Real Salt Lake's Álvaro Saborío was voted Major League Soccer Player of the Week by the North American Soccer Reporters (NASR) for Week 18 of the 2012 MLS season. Saborío scored three second-half goals to give Real Salt Lake a 3-0 victory over the Portland Timbers.

Saborío broke the deadlock in the 60^th minute by heading in a Kyle Beckerman cross.

His second came just two minutes later when the Costa Rican attacker got behind the Portland defense, latched onto a deep pass, and nodded the ball past Timbers goalkeeper Troy Perkins.

Saborío wrapped up the hat trick by capitalizing on a penalty kick opportunity in the 75^th minute.

The three-goal performance was his third multiple-goal game this season and moved him into third place in the Golden Boot standings with 10 goals in 20 games played.

The MLS Player of the Week is selected each week of the regular season by a panel of journalists from NASR. The group consists of members of print, television, radio and online media. More information and membership information can be found at http://www.soccerreporters.com/.

OFF MY SOAPBOX