COMMERCE CITY – Just because the Rapids went almost three weeks without a competitive game doesn’t mean they haven’t been competing.
Coach Pablo Mastroeni wants his players to approach practice scrimmages with game intensity – something for which he was legendary as a player – and occasionally someone has to pay the price. Or two people.
In a training session Sunday, defender Jared Watts and midfielder Dillon Powers clashed heads going for a ball in the air. Watts broke several teeth and Powers wound up with several staples in his head.
“You train the way you want to play, and those are the things that go with it,” Mastroeni said Wednesday, three days before the team returns to MLS action at home against the Chicago Fire after a three-week adjournment for national team cup competitions in Europe and the U.