CARSON, Calif. – Real Salt Lake’s midfield diamond is one of the defining aspects of the possession-oriented playing style that has led RSL to seven consecutive postseason experiences.
This season RSL head coach Jason Kreis has primarily turned to the quartet of Kyle Beckerman in the back, Javier Morales at the point, and Luis Gil and Ned Grabavoy on the flanks. With the diamond, Salt Lake is able to control the tempo and create scoring opportunities that have helped Salt Lake to an MLS-best of 57 goals scored in 2013.
Even though the diamond is an identifying factor of RSL’s style of play, Galaxy defender Todd Dunivant admits that it is RSL’s fluidity with their formation that causes problems for opposing defenses.
“They like to unbalance you. They like to overload sides; they like to play out of position if you will. They don’t have traditional positions and their diamond turns into all sorts of shapes throughout the game,” said defender Todd Dunivant. “What that does is that pulls defenders out of position and causes chaos. They run in behind, their midfielders make late runs and they punish you so from that standpoint, we need to be good. We need to be talking all the time, shifting and [we need to] be disciplined.”
But just don’t count Galaxy head coach Bruce Arena among those who believe that formation will change the outcome of the first leg between LA and RSL.
“It has nothing to do with diamonds or any of that other stuff, it’s 11 against 11,” said Arena. “The shape of your midfield is usually based on the talents and skills of your players so they just pieced their formation based on the group they have in the midfield and to play off their strengths and weaknesses the right way.”
