While RSL continues to negotiate with forward Alvaro Saborio on a new contract and prepare its list of 11 guys to protect from the upcoming expansion draft, its players and team officials can look forward to some new twists in Major League Soccer next season.

League commissioner Don Garber announced at the MLS Cup in Toronto on Sunday that the league will play a balanced 34-game schedule next season — that means every team will play every other team, home and away — and allow 10 teams to make the playoffs, instead of just eight.

The exact details have not been finalized.

But the fourth and fifth seeds in each conference are expected to hold a mini-playoff to reach the main postseason field, though it's not certain whether that would entail a two-leg series or just a one-off elimination game. Garber also hinted that teams from one conference no longer will be able to make the playoffs by slotting into the other conference, as happened this season with the Colorado Rapids — who beat FC Dallas 2-1 on Sunday night for their first league championship.

“We're going to find a way to fix that,” he said.

Meanwhile, Garber also said the league is studying whether to move to a fall-to-spring schedule that would conform to the international soccer calendar, perhaps with a winter break. Many analysts view that suggestion as one meant mostly to pacify the top officials at FIFA, who will decide Dec. 2 on the host nations for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.

The United States is lobbying for the 2022 World Cup — Australia, South Korea, Japan and Qatar are the other finalists — but FIFA president Sepp Blatter has frequently maligned the MLS schedule format as out of touch with the rest of the world.

Garber did not assign a timetable to the league's study of a calendar switch.

The league already had increased roster sizes from 24 to 30 for next season, and will expand to 18 teams with Portland and Vancouver joining the league. The balanced schedule is sure to face changes again when Montreal becomes the 19th MLS team in 2012, and if another team in New York becomes the 20th team for the 2013 season.