Weekend Review: Seattle, Dallas draw; San Jose beats Houston

With things coming down to the wire for RSL, we thought we’d take a look at results around the league and how they impact Real Salt Lake’s future with the playoffs looming. Let it be known that the playoffs are (in my opinion but we’re gonna treat that like doctrine) a nice to have and not the only measure of success/failure for this season — however, we’re so close we can taste it and hot damn we want into that party.

Houston 0 - 1 San Jose

This is the matchup that we all should have had our eyes on as far as place in the west was concerned. Houston winning would have helped us leap frog even higher than we have. San Jose came into this one without Anibal Godoy and Darwin Ceren but were still able to find a way to get three points in a very even match. These teams confuse me more than most in the west, as Houston **should have** walked away with this one. Road form comes into play there, San Jose and Houston are both great at home but kind of terrible on the road.

Also, can we talk about the touch from ex-Rusnak teammate Hoesen here?

San Jose are at DC United on the weekend. Definitely keep an eye on that. Houston are at NYCFC and that should also be watched. Lots going on.

Seattle 0 - 0 FC Dallas

Our next opponent vs a team that kicked our butts a few months ago (who has since bombed out and is winless since July 22). Looking at Seattle they feel a lot like the Galaxy of old — draw after draw but they’re getting points. Saturday the two played in what has been described as a snore-fest which means a solid defensive match. It’s one that really could have gone FC Dallas’ way were it not for a quick save from Frei on a Kellyn Acosta snap shot.

That this game was a draw goes to show that Seattle is two things, tight defensively and relatively soft in the attack (only two shots on goal). Their game is about getting the ball into a high position on the wings and sending in a cross that they hope Dempsey or Bruin will get on to for a chance. Very hit or miss. The other interesting thing with Seattle in this one is the number of completely unnecessary yellow cards. 1 for dissent and 3 for unsporting behavior. Sadly, this does not mean that some Sounders will miss the match on Saturday.

In other news:

Sporting KC beat up on New England (3-1) — We play them in a few weeks and I’m sure we’ll talk about them plenty before then.

LA ran into the TFC train (4-0 to TFC). It was messy. LA is not good. Play them in two weeks so that should be fun.

Minnesota beat Montreal (3-2) who have now lost 3 straight and Nacho Piatti didn’t score v MNUFC which seems odd.