Real Salt Lake would have liked to see a few streaks end Saturday night. Instead, its chances of pulling out three points on the road all but ended in the first 10 minutes of action.
Ante Razov made history, as he became the third player in MLS history to reach the century mark in goals scored as his Chivas USA team blew RSL out, 4-0, in front of 11,253 fans at the Home Depot Center in Carson, Calif.
RSL was simultaneously trying to snap a five-game winless streak against Chivas USA and a two-game winless streak to open up the 2007 season. But rookie Maykel Galindo personally saw to it that those two streaks would continue.
“We felt good, two ties, we were looking for our first win and it didn’t end up that way,” RSL head coach John Ellinger said. “In the first 10 minutes we lost the game.”
It took Galindo just 28 seconds to score the first goal of the match and the first of his career. Eight minutes later, Galindo tacked on the second goal of his career and gave Chivas USA a two-goal lead that it never surrendered.
Galindo’s first goal came after Chivas defender Alex Zotinca sent a pass onto the speedy Cuban at the fringes of the RSL penalty area. Garlindo took the pass and beat RSL goalkeeper Nick Rimando less than 30 seconds after the starting whistle.
Galindo’s speed proved to be too much for RSL defender Jack Stewart in the ninth minute as well. Zotinca joined forces with Sacha Kljestan to find Galindo sprinting down the right side of the field. Stewart could not keep pace with Galindo, and the Chivas rookie beat RSL down the right side and found the back of the net of his right foot.
“I feel happy,” Galindo said. “I had been searching for it, I was working really hard because I knew that I needed that first goal in order to take off the pressure and thank God, those goals helped to begin the team’s victory.”
RSL allowed Chivas to add to its two-goal lead in the final minute of the first half as Galindo once again found a crease in the RSL defense before sending a pass onto Francisco Mendoza. Mendoza subsequently lobbed a pass into the mixer and Razov’s got a head on the ball, and made history as the ball found the back of the goal.
The only other players in MLS history to accumulate 100 goals are RSL’s Jason Kreis — who is the career goal leader with 108 — and DC United’s Jaime Moreno, who has 105 career goals.
Real Salt Lake will return home in search of its first win of the season against its Rocky Mountain rival Colorado Rapids on April 30.