Original article can be found here.

With their 4-0 loss Wednesday night at Supporters’ Shield leader Nashville SC, Sporting Kansas City were eliminated from the playoffs for a third straight season.

Now SKC will try to bring others down as well, starting Saturday night when they host a Real Salt Lake team looking for every point it can get to stay in the Western Conference playoff picture.

Sporting KC (6-19-4, 22 points) started three teenagers in a match for the first time in club history, and the results weren’t pretty. Nashville scored three goals before a half-hour expired and outshot the visitors 20-7 for the match.

Midfielder Jake Davis wants to see better results now.

“I think we need to focus on everything we can give this weekend,” he said in response to a question about the final five matches of the year. “I think we’re going to go out, be strong, bring our quality and put on a good performance for our fans and beat Salt Lake.”

One bright spot for Kansas City lately has been 24-year-old Andre Luiz, who’s scored seven goals in his first eight matches.

Meanwhile, Real Salt Lake (9-14-6, 33 points) enter play five points out of the last playoff position in the West standings. They’re coming off a 1-1 draw Wednesday night at home against San Jose that could have been three points instead of just one. But RSL conceded in the fifth minute of second-half stoppage time.

Coach Pablo Mastroeni attributed the draw to “the worst luck on the planet.”

He said, “I think there’s a million things that could’ve had happened and it wouldn’t have led to that goal. It was just such a stroke of bad fortune because I thought the guys were excellent. But the onus is on us to get back to work.”

With star midfielder Diego Luna (knee) out for the season, RSL are relying more on the likes of rookie Sergi Solans. His 11 goals and 14 goal contributions lead the team.

Solans scored earlier in the season when RSL outshot SKC 22-5 during a 3-1 home win.

Real Salt Lake are 8-2-2 in the last dozen matches between the clubs.

–Field Level Media

Original article
Add as a preferred source on Google