SANDY, Utah (AP) - Real Salt Lake fell out of first place in the Western Conference after a 2-1 loss to the San Jose Earthquakes at Rio Tinto Stadium.
Reserve forward Alan Gordon scored a goal and assisted on another from Chris Wondolowski off of a throw-in in the 84th minute to lift the San Jose Earthquakes to the victory, which allowed San Jose (10-3-3) to move ahead of RSL.
“I don’t know a time that I felt as mad as I do right now," said head coach Jason Kreis. "I’ll be honest with you, soccer can be a very cruel game. I think tonight was every indication of that. We had a ton of chances where we don’t finish in their box and they created a couple of chances and finished. We had players that made big mistakes again, so it’s heartening for sure.”
Javier Morales scored for RSL (10-5-2), which suffered its second straight home loss in MLS action and third consecutive setback at Rio Tinto Stadium overall.
"We gave up two soft goals and we didn’t finish clear cut chances," said midfielder Kyle Beckerman. "Those two combined, you’re not going to win many games. It doesn’t matter if you’re home or away. We created the chances that you need to win a game.”
The Earthquakes opened the scoring in the 76th minute when Ramiro Corrales played a long ball down to Gordon inside the box. Gordon headed the ball over Rimando before he could get to it. The ball bounced across the goal line and into the net to give San Jose a 1-0 lead.
“I’m discouraged and mad at the world, of course, like I have never been before that I can remember but I’m not ready to throw in the towel and say that we’ve lost the mystique of Rio Tinto," said Kreis. "We just need to correct some small things. For me it’s two games in a row. Honest to god, we didn’t lose the game, we gave the game away, twice in a row, so if someone comes in here and beats us from end line to end line for 90 minutes then I will have a different answer for you but right now we are beating ourselves.”
Real returns to MLS action Saturday night at Columbus. The match will start at 6:00 and can be seen on CW30.
