SAN JOSÉ, Costa Rica – On Saturday night, two familiar faces appeared on the television screen at the Montreal Impact's team hotel.
Here were Impact head coach Frank Klopas and technical director Adam Braz, taking in a game just after arriving in Costa Rica. And not as tourists.
Klopas and Braz were at work, watching Alajuelense, the team they will face on Tuesday in the semifinals of the CONCACAF Champions League. It’s a squad that they’d been studying for weeks, whose different lineups they’ve analyzed over and over.
On Saturday, Alajuelense lost at Cartaginés, 3-1. La Liga barely played any starters, giving Klopas and Braz more of an indication of how seriously they take Tuesday’s game than of any tactical elements. Still, Klopas said on Monday that the 50-mile round trip was worth it.
“We have watched a lot of games of them playing. They’ve used different lineups. But for me, it was either stay at the hotel or go watch a game, and I'd rather do that,” Klopas told reporters.
“It was good. Overall, I just wanted to see the mentality of the team and also the league. It was good to see them play. I know they didn’t use a lot of their [regular] guys, but it just gave me a good idea, reinforce some things in my mind, just the mentality of the team and the attitude that they have in every game.”
There is no mistaking what that attitude will be on Tuesday. Alajuelense will go for the jugular as soon as possible. When Alajuelense last played a CCL game at Estadio Alejandro Morera Soto, D.C. United found themselves 3-1 down 30 minutes in.
Regardless of who they play, Klopas said, Alajuelense will just “come out and push the game.”
“That’s just the way they are,” Klopas said. “You take this game into account, and the fact that they’re down 2-0, we know that it’s not going to change. We have to be ready. In our mentality and our approach, we have to be ready for a fast start. We have to match the intensity.”
And don’t expect Montreal to just settle for absorbing pressure.
“We’re not a team that’s going to sit back,” Klopas said. “There’ll be opportunities to press and go high, look to take advantage of the breaks that we get.”
