Five losers, one winner from RSL’s 2-1 loss to LA Galaxy

Well, this is gonna be fun.

Loser: Corey Baird

Did you know that Corey Baird played 90 minutes in this match? I wouldn’t have believed it myself if I hadn’t checked. A funny fact is that if you overlay Justen Glad’s passes on top of Corey Baird’s, it’s incredibly obvious that Glad did more, was more involved in the attack, and more dangerous. That’s weird. Glad was a right back.

Also, Baird did have a nice chipped shot that nearly went in, but a beautiful clearance by Giancarlo Gonzalez kept him off the sheet. It does go some way to show that Baird is a wholly unpredictable figure.

Loser: Albert Rusnak

Rusnak’s stock has fallen so far, for me. 2020 has hardly been his year, but the worst part of all this is that he’s bereft of ideas. In a way, it’s fitting that he wears the armband, because his play is really reflective of all of Real Salt Lake’s.

Loser: Damir Kreilach

Kreilach was dead on his feet out there. He didn’t have the energy to do anything at forward against a condensed defense, and it was too little, too late by the time he moved into the midfield. It’s too bad, really.

Also, he was bad defensively on the free kick that led to LA going up 1-0, and that made me sad.

Loser: Everton Luiz

It pains me to say it, but Everton Luiz was bad. He has been bad for most of the year. It’s not great, and it’s painful to have him lacking quality so frequently. I miss him being good.

Winner: Douglas Martinez

He scored a nice goal. But he gave me hope, and that was not very kind of him.

Loser: Marcelo Silva

I know that Cristian Pavon is a good player, and maybe I should cut Marcelo Silva a little slack, but he got completely decimated on the counter-attacking goal in the second half. Pavon just waltzed right by him. Silva is a better defender than that, but he’s also plenty error-prone, so I guess this is just what you get.

Loser: Freddy Juarez

I know coach speak is not always meaningful, but for his first statements after the match to be about how much energy the team had — well, it’s not a look that garners much sympathy, especially when the statement doesn’t really pass the smell test. He could use a lesson from Damir Kreilach, who started his post-match interview apologizing to fans. (I’m not saying Juarez should have apologized, but seriously — we were just knocked out of playoff contention. Read the room.)