Real Salt Lake Vs. Colorado Rapids: Pablo Mastroeni Will Likely Miss Rivalry Game

With blogs devoted to covering 15 (soon to be 16) of the 18 MLS teams, we tend to rely on the knowledge of those who follow the team on a daily basis. Many of our bloggers like to trade information before matchups in a feature cleverly referred to as "Three Questions." And sometimes, we unearth information like this: Colorado Rapids midfielder Pablo Mastroeni is likely going to miss Wednesday's match against Real Salt Lake, at least according to Burgundy Wave via RSL Soapbox.

3) Without Pablo Mastroeni in the lineup on Friday night the Rapids looked very disorganized against FC Dallas, if he is unable to go on Wednesday night, who if anyone can fill in for him?

A) To start, I'll say that it's more a "when" than a "what if" question right now from what I've heard, Mastroeni will almost certainly miss the Wednesday game after straining his leg in pre-game against the Hoops. What we might see is a surprise tactical shift from Gary Smith. The four players behind Mastroeni on the depth chart are very young guys, two CDMs and two ACMs. We've seen Joesph Nane many times before both last week and in Toronto, and what we've seen has been terrible. Ross LaBeaux is still very much a work in progress but will probably be the starter if Smith decides to keep his usual formation. My guess is we'll see a surprise shift to an attacker in Pablo's usual spot with Jeff Larentowicz charged with taking over his spot. The question would be, who? Steven Emory and Davy Armstrong are both newbies with the team who may be aching for their first spot, but Ben and I have a theory that you might just see Jamie Smith go into the central spot, his original location and a spot he played very well against the Portland Timbers earlier in the year. A midfield of something to the tune of Thompson - Smith - Larentowicz - Mullan will probably give the Rapids the best chance of having a shot against RSL with Mastroeni out.