You want goals? Maikel Chang and Co. will give you goals — the most of the season, in fact.
Chang scored two goals less than four minutes apart in the second half, and Andrés Gómez and Danny Musovski added a goal and an assist as Real Salt Lake rallied twice to eliminate the Portland Timbers, 4-3, on the road Wednesday night in the fourth round of the Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup at Providence Park in Portland, Oregon.
Sebastian Blanco, Justin Rasmussen and Jaro Niezgoda each scored for the Timbers, which became the second-straight host to fall to RSL after going winless in its first five Open Cup road attempts before a 3-1 win at USL Championship squad Las Vegas Lights FC two weeks ago.
And after playing to back-to-back scoreless draws in MLS play, Salt Lake’s latest result was anything-but. And just like that — combined with LA Galaxy’s 3-1 win over the Seattle Sounders — Cascadia came crashing out U.S. Soccer’s version of the FA Cup.
“I thought it was a fantastic performance. A lot of guys got a great opportunity tonight, and they did a great job,” RSL manager Pablo Mastroeni said. “It was a real collective effort, and these kind of Cup games are always crazy. You never know what to anticipate. But I think the guys managed the game the right way, didn’t lose their cool after going down 3-2, and found a winner.
“I’m really pleased with the performance, and big-picture, I’m really pleased with the performances on top of performances. We’re really building as a group.”
jaws immediately hit the floor pic.twitter.com/0vp0mpBoKS
— Real Salt Lake (@realsaltlake) May 11, 2023
Blanco opened the scoring just five minutes in following a chaotic frenzy on RSL’s back line. But this match was just getting started, with three ties and three lead changes still on deck before goalkeeper Gavin Beavers made four saves and a back line of Delentz Pierre, Justen Glad and Bode Hidalgo and Braian Ojeda as a late sub helped kill off the one-goal win.
Suddenly, a club that sits a point off the MLS Cup playoff line in the Western Conference after close to a third of the season has found new life in the oldest knockout competitions in North American soccer.
“I think it shows that we’ve got a lot of fight in us,” Musovski said. “That game was really wild, with them going up early, then us taking the lead, then them taking the lead. It was a lot of ups and downs, but I think through it all, we were fighting the entire time. We showed that we have a lot of grit, and we want to make a run in this Cup.”
The accuracy ????#RCTID pic.twitter.com/qyJXUkJcoY
— Portland Timbers (@TimbersFC) May 11, 2023
The Argentine took advantage of pressure in the back forced by Noel Caliskan before slotting home a right-footed shot down the center of the box and past Beavers, the 18-year-old goalkeeper making his second start in Open Cup play this year.
But that wasn’t the end of it. Far from it.
“We allowed them to score four goals at home which is not good, and the way we sometimes allow those moments to happen, we need to have a little bit more maturity,” Timbers coach Giovanni Savarese said. “But again, it’s good for some of the players that don’t have that many minutes to be able to come and play, that makes them better, that makes them stronger, that makes them more available to be able to compete and ready to play. In St. Louis, we put in a mature performance, today we put in the effort, the energy, the good plays — but maturity is what was missing. Losing this game at home, allowing four goals after we scored three is no good. We talked about it in the locker room and the guys took the responsibility and now we continue to work.”
Musovski equalized in the 30th minute, taking a pass across the face of goal from Chang via Bryan Oviedo with the slightest touch from Damir Kreilach, finishing it for his second goal in as many matches in the Open Cup to help the visitors turn the tide quickly.
OPEN CUP MANIA!!!! pic.twitter.com/HF4s8bTvUX
— Real Salt Lake (@realsaltlake) May 11, 2023
Gómez scored a banger in the 40th minute, lifting RSL to a 2-1 advantage following Bode Hidalgo’s set piece. The Salt Lake side put just three of their seven first-half shots on target, but Beavers made four saves and passed at 91.7% clip to keep RSL ahead.
Justin Rasmussen equalized for the Timbers in the 49th minute, taking a touch from Caliskan near the top of the box before converting a banger from distance for the Timbers’ second goal.
Three minutes later, Niezgoda pushed Portland back in front with a banger from just outside the box. But you didn’t think that was the end of it, did you?
Gómez found Chang in the 55th minute as the Cuban scored the first of two goals less than four minutes apart, and RSL took a 4-3 advantage in the middle of the smoky artificial turf at Providence Park.
“Chang has proven that he’s a fantastic player in this league, and he comes up huge when necessary,” Mastroeni said. “I couldn’t be happier for a player who waits patiently for his time, and then when his time comes, he’s ready to go. That’s what we talk about all the time; you’ve got to be ready to go. And this moment was Chang’s moment.”
WE TOLD Y’ALL!!! pic.twitter.com/yLIaob4fZK
— Real Salt Lake (@realsaltlake) May 11, 2023
The latter goal came as Damir Kreilach found Musovski, who found Chang for the visitors’ second go-ahead goal of the match on a counter attack in the 59th minute of a #DrunkOpenCup match in the Rose City.
“I saw Chang wide open, and I knew I just had to thread it firmly, and then Chang did a great job finishing,” Musovski said.
Portland threw the kitchen sink in search of an equalizer, but Beavers stood strong, including stopping an attempt in the fifth minute of stoppage time to keep the hosts at bay and book passage to the Round of 16 for only the third time in 13 Open Cup appearances (and the first since advancing to the semifinals in 2015).
“I’m really proud of the collective performance,” said Mastroeni, whose group hosts LAFC on Saturday (7:30 p.m. MT, MLS Season Pass). “Guys understand the way we want to play, and commit their lives to doing whatever it takes to win games, being a strong group inside the locker room. All these things are the intangibles that lead you in the right direction.
“The sky’s the limit for this group. But we’ve got to put our heads down. We’ve got a great opponent coming in this weekend, we’ve got to do a great job against them, and then we’ve got to just keep moving forward.”
RSL and the rest of the Round of 16 qualifiers, which include 14 MLS clubs and two from the second-division USL Championship, will find out the draw for the next round Thursday at 12 p.m. MT from U.S. Soccer on the B/R Football YouTube channel.
