SANDY — Real Salt Lake's Reserves played what amounted to an away game at Rio Tinto Stadium on Saturday evening, and that was just fine with coach Jason Kreis.
The purpose of scheduling the friendly with the Under-21 Mexican National Team was to provide RSL's youngsters with valuable experience, and they got plenty of it in a 1-1 draw in front of a partisan Mexican crowd.
"What we crave in a game like this is experience for our players that don't get to play much, and we got that, and some good experience, too. To have to deal with playing in front of a crowd that's pretty hostile, to have to go a man down, a lot of emotions involved," said Kreis.
Mexico was the better team throughout the match against an RSL side that featured two guest players, but it needed an 84th minute free kick goal from Erbin Trejo to salvage the draw.
"I was proud of our effort, we worked hard, but ultimately they were a little bit more organized than us," said defender Tony Beltran, who played all 90 minutes.
It was a chippy game throughout, with 33 combined fouls, six yellow cards and two red cards. One of those red cards was shown to a Mexico player for coming off the bench, and RSL midfielder Jean Alexandre received the other ejection in the 68th minute.
Realistically, the red card should've been given to Raushawn McKenzie for shoving Trejo in the face, but the ref mistakenly gave it to the wrong player.
Real Salt Lake's lone goal was scored by Pablo Campos in the 57th minute.
NOT IN MY HOUSE: Of the 21 fouls committed by Real Salt Lake, midfielder Nelson Gonzalez was responsible for six. The Argentine almost singlehandedly created the tension between the two teams that lasted all game.
Kreis said that passion is why RSL pursued Gonzalez last summer.
"I know he was getting very frustrated in the first half and made a couple fouls that he probably doesn't need to, but at the same time there's not a whole lot of other guys showing a lot of heart, so I'm pleased he's making a statement by saying we can't let them dictate the flow here in our stadium," said Kreis.
Gonzalez recorded the lone assist on Campos' goal.
BACK IN THE MIX: Salt Lake midfielder Ned Grabavoy played the final 28 minutes of Saturday's match, his first competitive game since injuring his knee in the first half of RSL's third match of the season.
"Felt pretty good to get out there," said Grabavoy. "I've been training here the last week. Sometimes it's just better to get out there and play against another team and not think about it when I'm out there."
RSL DEBUTS: Saturday's friendly marked the RSL debut for midfielder Luis Gil and defender Chris Schuler.
e-mail: jedward@desnews.com