When he was younger, Real Salt Lake's Javier Morales looked up to famous countryman Guillermo Barros Schelotto, to the point of owning a replica of his Boca Juniors jersey.

But tonight, they're finally on even footing.

Presuming Schelotto plays when Morales and RSL meet his Columbus Crew tonight in Ohio -- he's nursing a hamstring injury and listed as questionable -- the game will mark the first time that the fellow Argentine midfielders meet as Major League Soccer all-stars, with Morales having been named to the All-Star team for the first time earlier this week.

"I enjoy when I play with good players like him," Morales said.

Of course, Schelotto still has the superior résumé, as the league's reigning most valuable player and leading scorer with 10 goals. But Morales isn't doing too badly himself, having steadily fought back from a rough start to the season to help RSL construct a five-game unbeaten streak that it will try to extend tonight at Crew Stadium against a team that hasn't lost at home in 17 straight league games.

Striker Pablo Campos is expected to start for RSL just two days after being acquired in a trade, and both teams will be severely shorthanded due to injuries, suspensions and international duty.

Neither team expects to field a full 18-man team, with the Crew's Robbie Rogers, Chad Marshall and Emmanuel Ekpo all gone or suspended, and RSL without suspended forward Fabian Espindola as well as midfielders Kyle Beckerman, Will Johnson and Jean Alexandre, who are with Rogers and Marshall playing in the Gold Cup. Both Beckerman and Marshall are all-stars, along with Schelotto and Morales.

Coach Jason Kreis said he doesn't expect the absences to drastically change the look of the game, and believes what few players he has available still are capable of pulling out a result on the road, where RSL remains just 1-5-2 this season. His team also will be without veteran midfielder Andy Williams, who's with his wife as she battles leukemia in Seattle.

"All of those 'disturbances,' so to speak -- the things that could cause teams to be looking this way or that way -- have caused us to come together," Kreis said. "We saw real signs of that last week" in an exhibition victory over Mexico's Club America.

Morales has been part of the reason.

The 29-year-old has steadily improved after a rough start to the season, and said he's looking forward to playing alongside Schelotto for the first time when the MLS All-Stars meet Everton FC at Rio Tinto Stadium on July 29.

But first, there's the small matter of tonight, when Morales has a chance to show how well he compares to a player he describes as perhaps the smartest in the league, against whom he has played both in MLS and back home in Argentina.

His coach, at least, has a good idea about the answer.

"They're both very, very smart soccer players who are very, very gifted, technically, with the ball," Kreis said. "Both extremely good passers, extremely good strikers of the ball on free-kick situations and servers on dead-ball situations and corner kicks.

"The difference for me I think is Javier is younger, fitter, more willing and able to defend and do work on both sides of the ball," he added. "Because of that, I think Guillermo is probably afforded the option to be a little fresher when they get the ball. So all the guys around him basically do all of his work defensively such that when the ball turns over, he's oftentimes a fresher player and more able to make some special things happen for them."

mcl@sltrib.com