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San Jose, Costa Rica • Dwayne De Rosario of the New York Red Bulls posted first, wishing Real Salt Lake luck via his Twitter feed. Then goalkeeper Joe Cannon of the Vancouver Whitecaps offered his support, and several teams such as the Columbus Crew and Portland Timbers joined the online chorus.
Clearly, RSL was carrying the dreams of Major League Soccer into the second leg of its CONCACAF Champions League semifinal against Saprissa on Tuesday night.
"That's the exciting part," midfielder Will Johnson said before the game. "We have the whole league behind us, fans from all over the country are going to be watching and cheering us on and we've got to represent" the league.
No MLS team has reached the Champions League semifinals since the tournament was rebranded from the old Champions Cup in 2008.
But goalkeeper Nick Rimando said that accomplishment isn't enough for RSL.
"Everybody's like, 'You made history already,' " he said, but "I kind of don't see history being made until we have that trophy. People remember people that win, teams that win. And, yeah, we were the first team to get this far, but it says nothing if we don't win the tournament."
Midfielder Kyle Beckerman agreed, saying "it won't be anything for us just to be in the semis."
"We want to win everything," he added, meaning the Champions League, the Supporters Shield and the MLS Cup trophy.
RSL will face either Cruz Azul or Monterrey of Mexico in the Champions League finals, with the first leg on the road April 20. The return leg will be April 27 at Rio Tinto Stadium, where RSL will have a chance to hoist the trophy and book a place in the Club World Cup in Japan in December.
And Rimando said that's exactly what RSL expected to do.
"We expect to go out there and go to the next round," he said before the game. "I don't want to say we're going to win, but we expect to go to the next round. If that's tying, if that's losing 1-0, that's it."