Vacations are not supposed to be a summer staple of MLS teams. The weekly grind of the league calendar usually means a week off at most between MLS matches.
But the San Jose Earthquakes currently find themselves in the midst of an unusual three-week break from league play. The Quakes last played a league match on Aug. 29 at New England, and in the interim they are doing what they can to stay sharp, with their next league match not set to take place until Sept. 18 against Colorado.
Suffice it to say, the unusual gap between games is something the players are still wrapping their collective head around.
"In my career, I've never seen anything like it," said defender Jason Hernandez. "It's strange to be going weeks and weeks without a game. But we don't make the schedule. We just have to make the best of it."
Of course, the flip side is that the team has had a chance to heal up from any nagging injuries, and should be raring to go once league play resumes.
"My legs feel great. I've been getting a lot more sleep lately," said midfielder Shea Salinas. "I felt much worse last season at this time, particularly because it was my rookie year and I wasn't used to the long season. But I feel great. I think most of the guys do as well."
San Jose spent the last week taking their frustrations out on two exhibition opponents. And manager Frank Yallop pronounced himself pleased with the results, a 6-0 win against a local amateur all-star team, and a 0-0 draw against Salvadoran side CD Aguila. Not only did he get a chance to get a look at new signing Fabio da Silva, but players now on the fringes of the team were able to get some valuable minutes on the field.
The trick now is to keep some semblance of momentum going, but with eight days to go in their hiatus, the players will now be relying on one another to stay sharp.
"For us, we've concentrated on having good weekly training and building up to the [Colorado] game," said Hernandez. "I think that's very important and that hasn't changed, and we've been doing that. Hopefully we won't come out a half step slow when the game counts next week."
To that end, the team will also engage in an intrasquad scrimmage this weekend. The question of course is: Can the team find a way to hone their competitive edge playing each other?
"A scrimmage is just as intense if not more intense than a friendly," said defender Chris Leitch. "Any time you line up against each other, we normally give ourselves a good battle.
"It's a little bit different too, because when you do an intrasquad game you've played with those players so you know them inside and out. It's like scouting a team for a whole year. You know what every guy can do and what he wants to do. It becomes be a good game. You've got one side trying to force the other guy into something that they're not comfortable with. It helps that guy to get better at that particular aspect of his game, so they're always chippy and always good games."
For Salinas, that edge was clearly on display during last Tuesday's friendly against Aguila, one in which he was ejected for a rash challenge on the opposition goalkeeper. But the Quakes midfielder agrees that there won't be much let up when going up against his teammates.
"I probably won't be sliding in on my own 'keepers," admitted Salinas. "But it will be the same type of pressure, the same as I've been doing the last four or five weeks."
Whether that will be sufficient preparation for playing one of the better teams in MLS will be revealed in roughly a week's time.
Jeff Carlisle is a contributor to MLSnet.com.
