SANDY, Utah - The Real Salt Lake Under-17 Team began the defense of its SUM U-17 Cup title today in thrilling fashion, coming back from an early two-goal deficit to post a 3-2 victory over its counterparts from Toronto FC. After going down 2-0 midway through the first half, RSL would shake off the rust and use goals from Donny Toia, Jared Hanze and James Rogers that gave the junior Claret-and-Cobalt a thrilling comeback win and a vital three points to kick off play in the third annual edition of the tournament.
This year's Real Salt Lake SUM U-17 Cup roster is split evenly between the club's RSL-Utah and RSL-Arizona systems, with each branch being representing by nine players, while the RSL contingent will be headed by RSL Youth Development Technical Director and First Team Assistant Coach Brian Johnson, RSL-Utah Head Coach Greg Maas and RSL-Arizona Head Coach Jon Pearlman. The Real Salt Lake U-17s will have little rest over a busy Holiday weekend, first heading back to The DSG to take in tonight's Colorado Rapids-Chicago Fire match before getting right back to it for game two in pool play tomorrow evening against the Houston Dynamo.
With only 10 of Major League Soccer's 15 clubs being represented in this year's SUM U-17 Cup (down from 14 last year), the competition format has been changed for the 2009 tournament. In the first round, all teams will play three matches, with the standings after the completion of the pool matches determining the pairing for the final round of competition. The first and second place teams in the standings will play the championship match, while the remaining matches will determine third, fifth, seventh, and ninth places (goal differential and total goals scored will serve as the first two tiebreakers). Real Salt Lake came out of nowhere in the 2008 tournament, defeating defending champion D.C. United in last year's final at the same venue to give the Utah side's budding Youth Development Program a trophy from a major competition for the first time.
The winner will once again be invited to represent Major League Soccer in the 2010 "M18 Mundial Clubes de Futbol Sub-18" in Madrid, Spain. Real Salt Lake had the most success of any of the previous four MLS teams that took part in the Madrid-based tournament this past June, when the Claret-and-Cobalt nearly qualified for the knockout phase after going a respectable 0-1-2 against Serbia's Partizan Belgrado (1-1) and Spanish squads Espanyol (3-3), and Rayo Vallecano (0-1).
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