Three Points: Rapids take Rocky Mountain Cup for first time in 5 years

After Real Salt Lake’s 4–1 bat­ter­ing of the Rapids at Dick’s Sport­ing Goods Park three weeks ago, every­one thought the 2020 Rocky Moun­tain Cup had been decided.

Real Salt Lake claimed the tro­phy on Twit­ter, and Rapids coach Robin Fras­er con­ced­ed Fri­day that the Cup wasn’t at the front of his club’s mind.

It looked like the tro­phy would be won by the Claret-and-Cobalt for a fifth straight year.

Maybe the Rapids’ first goal in Sat­ur­day night’s stun­ning 5–0 vic­to­ry at Rio Tin­to Sta­di­um should’ve been a sign every­thing was about to change.

It came just three min­utes in, when for­ward Diego Rubio scored for the first time in 10 match­es this season.

“After the first goal, it was a release,” Rubio said. “It was like 20 pounds off my back.”

Or maybe it was Rubio’s sec­ond score, sev­en min­utes lat­er, that remind­ed every­one that this was indeed a rivalry.

“As soon as we scored two it was like final­ly, we are play­ing the way we want,” Rubio said. “After two goals, espe­cial­ly on the road, we were calm.”

No doubt the third score woke up a sleep­ing Rapids Nation that hadn’t seen the club win since March 7.

It was Col­orado native Sam Vines’ first career goal, com­ing four min­utes into the sec­ond half off a won­der­ful juke and cross from Younes Namli.

“With­out win­ning in six months, nobody was think­ing about the Cup. We just want­ed to score,” Rubio said.

Before they could even catch their breath in the Rocky Moun­tain air of Rio Tin­to, the Rapids scored a fourth — six min­utes lat­er — that felt historic.

Bra­ian Galván net­ted the first of his MLS career, with assists from Cole Bas­sett and Rubio. It put the Rapids ahead 4–0 and gave them a 5–4 edge on the Cup aggre­gate with 35 min­utes to play.

All they need­ed to secure the Cup was their first clean sheet of the year — or a fifth road goal for just the sec­ond time in fran­chise history.

They did both.

New­ly acquired William Yarbrough made his final stop in the 56th minute to record the club’s first shutout since Tim Howard retired.

And Bas­sett, the 19-year-old Col­oradan, put the fin­ish­ing touch­es on the Rapids’ first win over Real Salt Lake since 2017 with a fifth and final tally.

The goal came off rook­ie Jere­my Kelly’s first assist after he beat sev­en defenders.

“It was amaz­ing,” an elat­ed Rubio said postgame.

Up the ‘Pids?

The Rapids are now unbeat­en in their last four match­es and tied for the West’s final play­off spot.

Saturday’s increible 5–0 win — Colorado’s first at Rio Tin­to — was the largest vic­to­ry mar­gin in club history.

“Tonight is the first night oth­er peo­ple can see what we’re doing,” Fras­er said. “I’ve seen this progress com­ing. I’ve seen an iden­ti­ty build­ing. This is us val­i­dat­ing the work we’ve been doing.”

The Rapids are now pos­i­tive on goal dif­fer­en­tial and sit above pow­er­house LAFC on the table.

“No ques­tion the team feels good about them­selves. We have been pret­ty good for the last num­ber of weeks and we’ve not real­ly reward­ed our­selves,” Fras­er said. “It’s a feel­ing of satisfaction.”

Ruby, do you know what you’re doing to me?

Rubio had sol­id per­for­mances in 2020 but had yet to get on the score­sheet. Scor­ing two goals in 10 min­utes Sat­ur­day, he broke through for a Rapids offense that bad­ly need­ed pro­duc­tion from its forwards.

“Diego was absolute­ly fan­tas­tic tonight,” Fras­er said. “… I’m very hap­py for him, I think it was a very big moment for him.”

Rubio scored 11 goals in 2019, but had gone nine match­es with­out one this sea­son. With times tough, he turned to his father, Hugo, who spent eight years on the Chilean nation­al team.

“I was try­ing every­thing. I talked to my father to find out why I was not scor­ing,” Rubio said. “I felt like I need­ed to be more in the box.”

Cup home in Commerce City

For just the fourth time in 14 years, the Rocky Moun­tain Cup belongs to the bur­gundy boys.

The Rapids’ six goals in this season’s two Cup match­es rep­re­sent the club’s largest scor­ing total in the series since it net­ted sev­en in 2006.

(Vis­it­ed 1 times, 1 vis­its today)



Tags: suchen suche search tag anzeigen besucherzahl brows­er design domain inhalt jahr karpfen kon­to prob­lem inhalt schal­ten mod­ell­bahn spiele­max spiel tag web­seite preise werbung 

Ein Reichsmarschall von Adolf Hitler hatte auch Märklin Modelleisenbahn Modelle > read more

Schreibe einen Kommentar