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In a way, the road back to the CONCACAF Champions League final won't be quite as long for Real Salt Lake, this time.

It will play only four games in the group stage — two home, two away — instead of the six it played en route to the finals last year, when it lost to Monterrey of Mexico.

But general manager Garth Lagerwey knows there will be little room for error against CS Herediano of Costa Rica and Tauro FC of Panama, knowing that only the group champion will advance to the quarterfinals. Lagerwey said RSL probably must go at least 3-0-1 to advance.

"In order to be absolutely safe, you have to win all four games," he said. "But we're ready for it, and I think our guys are excited about it."

The good news for RSL is that it already has played in both places. Herediano plays on the outskirts of San Jose, where RSL met Saprissa in Costa Rica during last year's Champions League, while Tauro plays in the same stadium where RSL met Arabe Unido in Panama. On the other hand, though, "those are really the two longest trips we could possibly take," Lagerwey said, "and both teams are good."

Under a new format, the tournament now includes 24 teams, split into eight groups of three. Within each group, each team plays the other two, both home and away, starting July 31 — though an exact schedule is not expected to be released until at least next week.

Tough break

Midfielder Luis Gil has returned to RSL after spraining knee ligaments while training with the national U-20 team in Houston.

Gil is expected to be out about a month, team officials said, which could be a problem if regular starter Javier Morales isn't fully recovered from a strained quadriceps by the time RSL resumes Major League Soccer play at Chivas USA on June 16.

Gil had been scheduled to join the U-20 team for a series of three friendlies in Uruguay and Chile starting Wednesday.

Injury report

Not only is Morales still recovering from his injury, but several others are rehabbing as well.

Defender Chris Schuler is still resting to avoid developing a stress fracture in his foot, while midfielder Yordany Alvarez is recovering from a hamstring strain suffered in the loss to minor-league Minnesota in a U.S. Open Cup game last week. Forward Fabian Espindola and defender Jamison Olave both picked up calf strains in that game, too, and have been limited in training.

However, team officials expect everybody except Schuler and Gil to be mostly healthy in time for the game at Chivas USA.

Twitter: @MCLTribune —

Champions League

The exact schedule won't be known for a while yet, but RSL will play its Champions League group games in certain windows:

Match day 1 • July 31-Aug. 2

Match day 2 • Aug. 21-23

Match day 3 • Aug. 28-30

Match day 4 • Sept. 15-17

Match day 5 • Sept. 25-27

Match day 6 • Oct. 23-25