Real Salt Lake continues to make progress toward implementing a 4-3-3 formation in training camp and on Wednesday the focus was on transitioning from defense to offense within that formation.
During the morning session in Irvine, California, the team played a series of possession games, then added goals, focusing on keeping defensive shape and control of the ball. In the evening, the focus shifted to a bigger field as the team implemented different attacking patterns. The roles and responsibilities change pretty dramatically, but they do so with the aim of utilizing the strengths of the players on the field.
“They change drastically and you’re trying to introduce different movements,” RSL Head Coach Jeff Cassar said after completing the second day of camp in California. “When one thing happens, that triggers something else to happen and when that happens, something else happens. And it’s going to take time. But you want to introduce it, they start to feel it, then you start to see it happen in the games a few times and that’s really rewarding.”
Although the team is strewn with veterans who have played together for years, it can still take time to get them reacquainted with each other at the start of each season. That veteran core is helpful in implementing a new system, even while they are learning new roles themselves.
“They can create the tempo of the practice, the quality, the sharpness,” Cassar said of Kyle Beckerman, Javier Morales and Alvaro Saborio. “All those things that those guys demand each time they’re on the ball, everyone else tends to follow suit. When they’re good and sharp, usually everyone else is as well.”
RSL will hold four more training sessions – two each on Thursday and Friday – before facing UC-Irvine in a closed-door scrimmage on Saturday.
