He may only be in the early stages of a long professional career, but Albert Rusnák knows he will never forget his first championship – the KNVB Cup in The Netherlands with FC Groningen in 2015.
Only with the club for a few months at that point in the year, Rusnák wasn’t just a piece of the puzzle for Groningen in winning the cup for the first time in club history. He scored both goals in a 2-0 victory to lift the trophy.
This week, he will have something of a reunion when RSL faces the Chicago Fire at Toyota Park in Bridgeview, Illinois. The Fire, almost completely retooled in the last two seasons since Nelson Rodriguez took the reins as General Manager and he brought on Head Coach Veljko Paunovic, features a pair of Rusnák’s Groningen teammates on that KNVB Cup winning team in defender Johan Kappelhof and forward Michael de Leeuw.
“It’s the first trophy that I’ve won at age 20. It was a great time and I will remember the team forever,” Rusnák smiled this week when asked about meeting up with his old teammates again in Chicago. “All of us played in that game, so we were all involved. It’s just great memories.”
Still just 22 years old, Rusnák is the youngster of the bunch. Kappelhof, 26, and de Leeuw, 30, preceded the RSL midfielder in making the move to MLS by one season and he spoke with both of them before ultimately deciding to come to Real Salt Lake. Kappelhof was a rising defender who also was able to fill in as a holding midfielder, playing a key role in earning the shutout in the championship match. De Leeuw was a second striker, creating space in the attack and helping Rusnák in netting his championship double.
At that time, he was a young player looking to make his mark on a new club. Winning the cup was a key moment in establishing himself as an impact player in the Dutch league.
Now with one MLS game under his belt, he is readying for his first road match – flying over three hours to the Windy City in a departure from the short bus trips he would take in Holland.
While that lengthy travel is new and he has some familiar faces on the other end of his flight, he doesn’t anticipate seeing much of them outside of the 90 minutes. Once the match kicks off, though, he knows they will be seeing plenty of each other.
“I think I’ll meet both of them in the middle of the park,” he smiled, nodding his head.
Kickoff for Saturday’s match is scheduled for noon MT.
