MLS Cup 2009: Real Salt Lake wins

Sunday night in Seattle was a memorable night for MLS. Qwest Field was packed with over 45,000 fans, both teams played quality soccer and put out a good product and at the end of the day the underdog team walked away with the title.

After ending regulation and 2 overtimes tied 1-1, Real Salt Lake outlasted the Los Angeles Galaxy in penalty kicks to hoist the MLS Cup for the first time in their brief history. Salt Lake was the last team to qualify for the playoffs this year but they came into the match riding a wave of confidence after knocking off Columbus and Chicago en route to the Battle in Seattle. Real also rode the solid play of Kyle Beckerman and Jamison Olave who helped control the middle of the field and neutralized the Galaxy attack. LA suffered a heart breaking loss but didn't really do enough to earn this victory in regulation. David Beckham and Landon Donovan both failed to dominate the way that they should have and Donovan even missed his penalty during the shoot out to end his sub par night.

So, will this be the end of the Beckham experiment in LA? I have no freaking idea. We do know that Beckham will be moving on to Milan in January on loan and has every intention of playing for England in the World Cup in June if called upon. That would put his arrival in LA somewhere in August and would mean that 35 year old Beckham would have played soccer for more than 2 straight years without an off season. That also would mean that my last sentence had the word "would" in it 3 times. Then there is the fate of Landon Donovan which is also up in the air at this point. I'd put his chances of returning at 50/50, which means that I, once again, have no freaking idea.

Luckily for MLS fans, the off season begins very quickly as the expansion draft is just around the corner. Follow all the MLS news at www.soccerbyives.net.