Sporting Kansas City captain Matt Besler made his customary appearance on The Border Patrol this morning, joining hosts Nate Bukaty and Steven St. John ahead of Thursday’s decisive second leg of the Concacaf Champions League Round of 16 at Deportivo Toluca FC.
The center back called into the program from Albuquerque, New Mexico, where Sporting have spent the last few days training in altitude before they fly to Toluca on Wednesday. Besler helped anchor the backline in a resounding 3-0 first-leg victory last week at Children’s Mercy Park, but he knows the job is far from finished.
“We are definitely confident, but every team has a lot of confidence in training camp,” Besler said. “We’ve done a lot of talking and preparation, going through the details of how we want things to look.
“Usually it does take a few games to get into the rhythm of a 90-minute game, so the fact that we were able to look as sharp as we did (last Thursday) is a huge positive. That game was a lot of fun—we were feeling it with the ball and we looked like we had been playing for three or four months already.”
Sporting can advance to the Champions League quarterfinals with a win, a draw or a loss by two or fewer goals in the second leg at Toluca’s Estadio Nemesio Diez. The game will be played at a dizzying altitude of 8,750 feet, good for the highest-elevation match in Sporting’s 24-year history.
“Technically it’s only halftime,” Besler said. “We have a lot of work ahead of us with this game in Toluca.”
Besler also shared his thoughts on the potential challenge of playing three away games in seven days. Should Sporting get past Toluca, they will hit the road for the first leg of the Champions League quarterfinals two or three days after opening the MLS regular season Sunday at LAFC.
Listen to the full podcast below.
