Final
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Sporting aims to continue unbeaten streak against Chivas

Jul 8, 2011 - 6:18 PM Kansas City, KS (Sports Network) - Sporting Kansas City will be hoping to extend its unbeaten streak to 10 games on Saturday when the team welcomes Chivas USA to Livestrong Sporting Park.

Kansas City has been on a great run recently having won four of its last six games to move to within seven points of Eastern Conference leaders Red Bull New York.

Sporting will feel a bit unlucky not to have claimed all three points against the Colorado Rapids on Wednesday, but defender Matt Besler continues to focus on keeping the unbeaten streak alive, which Sporting did with a 1-1 draw.

"It would have been great to get the three points," Besler said. "I think we probably deserved it, but in the grand scheme of things we played well, we're still undefeated at home and we still have the unbeaten streak intact, so those are positives."

Kansas City is 2-0-2 in its new digs so far, but maybe more than a comfortable new home is the fact that the Sporting defense has been downright stingy during the team's unbeaten streak.

Over the past nine games, Kansas City has allowed just five goals total, with no team scoring more than one.

Chivas USA's recent form was not in the same class as Sporting over the past month, but the Goats snapped their poor run of play with a 2-0 win over the San Jose Earthquakes on Wednesday, a big result according to coach Robin Fraser.

"Win No. 5, in our opinion, has been a long time coming," said Fraser after the match. "We've played well enough to get results in the past, but this is part of our learning experience because it's not good enough to play well. You have to play well and play effectively over 90 minutes, and I think that for us, it's a good milestone, especially coming off the last few games where we've scored quite a few goals but have also given up quite a few as well."

One of the things that most pleased Fraser was the play of his team defensively, with San Jose managing to get just three shots on goal over the course of 90 minutes.

"The teams that play well are the ones that don't get involved in shootouts," he said. "You need to be disciplined defensively and find good opportunities, so I feel that tonight was a good building block for us."