Injuries, absences leave Real Salt Lake short-handed for FC Dallas

With a five-man call-up group for Real Salt Lake coupled with existing and new injuries, things are looking a bit grim in advance of Saturday's match against FC Dallas. Before we go all doom-and-gloom, though, I'll just note that I have a good deal of faith in this side, and it may not be nearly as bad as one might suppose. I hope.

International absences

Kyle Beckerman, Tony Beltran, Nick Rimando ... USMNT

Alvaro Saborio ... Costa Rica

Abdoulie Mansally ... The Gambia

Injuries

Chris Wingert: Knee soreness and return from surgery, out for a few more weeks

Nat Borchers: Quad tendon issue ... played 60 minutes for reserves

Carlos Salcedo: Concussion

Rich Balchan: Groin injury ... day-to-day

Khari Stephenson: Pulled at 45 minutes on Saturday with knee strain ... day-to-day

Javier Morales: Right knee ... starting to participate in training

David Viana: Quad strain ... should train fully this week

Worst-case lineup

Right, maybe it's not really a worst-case lineup, but worst-case insofar as if all of these players are indeed out for the match, this is what it would look like.

Josh Saunders; Enzo Martinez, Chris Schuler, Kwame Watson-Siriboe, Lovel Palmer; Yordany Alvarez, Ned Grabavoy, Luis Gil, Sebastian Velasquez; Robbie Findley, Devon Sandoval

Subs: Jeff Attinella, Lalo Fernandez, Aaron Maund, Cole Grossman, John Stertzer, Joao Plata, Olmes Garcia

Keep in mind, this is what it would look like if all players questionable with injury miss out; I'm hopeful that we won'.t you also note that I have Lalo Fernandez as a second goalkeeper on the bench. That's how thin we are with all these absences. Of course, after we saw him play up top against the reserves, we can derive something more. We probably shouldn't, though.

Best-case lineup

It's not so bad, really, and it's entirely reasonable to hope for this lineup.

Josh Saunders; Lovel Palmer, Kwame Watson-Siriboe, Nat Borchers, Chris Schuler; Yordany Alvarez, Ned Grabavoy, Luis Gil, Sebastian Velasquez; Robbie Findley, Devon Sandoval

Subs: Jeff Attinella, Aaron Maund, Rich Balchan, Khari Stephenson, John Stertzer, David Viana, Joao Plata

Nat Borchers played 60 minutes for the reserves and didn't come off with any apparent injury issues.