NEW YORK: The New York Red Bulls will hope their Cinderella run through the postseason will end with the trophy that has long eluded them on Saturday, when they face cross-country rivals LA Galaxy in the MLS Cup Championship match.
One of the top-flight North American league's founding franchises, the Red Bulls had not reached the championship match since 2008, when they lost 3-1 to Columbus Crew, and looked to be the underdogs again as the seventh seeds in the postseason.
But they defied the odds this time around, getting revenge over second seeds Columbus in the best-of-three first round, beating crosstown rivals NYCFC 2-0 in the semi-final and overcoming Orlando City 1-0 in the Conference Final.
In only his first year at the helm in New York, manager Sandro Schwarz said he was urging his players not to focus on the team's history but the challenge that lies ahead with a hostile away crowd in Carson, California.
"Our main focus has to be our daily training session, our video session and not to think too much about what can happen after the game or about the history of this title or something like that," Schwarz told reporters this week.
"Only to think about what we need on the field."
A youthful Red Bulls team is bolstered by talented veterans including Swedish midfielder Emil Forsberg and top scorer Lewis Morgan, who has bagged 13 goals this season.
But they face a tall order against Los Angeles, who have won eight of their last 10 matches and boast a record five MLS Cup trophies.
"We've known we've been underdogs going into loads of the games, we've embraced that and we'll embrace that again this weekend," said Morgan.
"We're not expected to go there and run all over LA Galaxy. We're expected to go there and make things difficult and try and impose our style of football, which is exactly what we're going to try to do."
The MLS Cup championship match kicks off on Saturday at 2100 GMT at Dignity Health Sports Park in Carson, California.