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Real Salt Lake-Fire Preview

Jul 31, 2009 - 8:11 PM By SANTOSH VENKATARAMAN STATS Senior Writer

Real Salt Lake (6-7-5) at Chicago (7-3-8), 8:30 p.m. EDT

With one of the worst home records in MLS, the Chicago Fire know they need to get their offense untracked at Toyota Park.

The Fire will try to do that Saturday night against Real Salt Lake, which has beaten Chicago just once in eight previous matchups.

Chicago (7-3-8) sits just one point behind first-place Columbus in the crowded Eastern Conference despite a dismal 2-2-4 home mark for 10 points. Only league-worst New York, which has nine points at home, has fared worse.

The Fire have scored a league-low total of seven goals at home, where they ended a three-game drought without a goal in a 2-0 win over San Jose on July 18. They were held in check, however, in their most recent game last Saturday in a scoreless draw at Seattle.

That result came largely thanks to goalkeeper Jon Busch, who made several spectacular saves among his five for the match.

"That's my job, to make saves and catch crosses. Some games, you have a lot to do, and some games, you don't," said Busch, who notched his sixth shutout of the season. "If we all work hard and stay focused defensively, we'll be OK at the end of the day. And we did that."

Chicago was forced to play with 10 players after midfielder John Thorrington was ejected with a second yellow card in the 54th minute for a hard tackle. Still, forward Chris Rolfe had five of the Fire's 11 total shots in the wide-open contest.

"That was about as exciting of a 0-0 game as you're going to have in our league," Fire coach Dennis Hamlett said. "Both teams came out to attack, and both teams had a chance to win the game. In the end, it was probably a fair result."

Thorrington is suspended for this game, but All-Star defender Bakary Soumare will be back after he was suspended for the Seattle game due to an accumulation of yellow cards.

The Fire are 4-1-3 all-time against Real Salt Lake (6-7-5), and 2-0-2 at home. RSL is 1-6-2 on the road this year.

The visitors will be without coach Jason Kreis after he was ejected during last week's 4-2 victory over FC Dallas. Kreis was red-carded during a thrilling second half in which Salt Lake scored four times to erase a 2-0 deficit.

Yura Movsisyan scored twice for RSL, which went ahead on an own-goal by Dallas in the 88th minute.

"We needed something like this to wake us up for the rest of the season," Movsisyan said. "Everyone was doubting us. We showed a lot of character, a lot of heart, and we got it done."

RSL has 23 points and sits in sixth place in the West, lagging behind numerous teams in the playoff race.