Los Angeles Galaxy Renew Rivalry With San Jose Earthquakes

The last time the Los Angeles Galaxy and San Jose Earthquakes got together, Mike Magee made himself a legend playing 47 minutes in goal and making four saves. The second running of the original California Clasico is set to kick off Saturday evening, and it's again set to be a milestone match; with Robbie Keane making his debut. Josh Saunders will be in the goal this time, against a struggling Earthquakes side. 

The Galaxy haven't played in an MLS match in two weeks. It was a good one, with the Galaxy defeating FC Dallas 3-1. The match saw Adam Cristman and Mike Magee starting up top, causing the Juan Pablo Angel departure rumors to swirl up. 

The Galaxy do have the 2-0 victory over Motagua in CONCACAF Champion's League play. Conversely, the Quakes are deep in the throes of a club-record winless run after a 2-1 loss to Colorado. The winless streak is now at 11 games. The Quakes have 25 points from 23 matches on the season, sitting at 8th place in the Western Conference. 

The Galaxy have 48 points from 25 matches on the season, leading the Western Conference and the overall MLS table. In their last match against FC Dallas, David Beckham recorded two assists which gave him ten assists on the season. This matches his MLS single season high, and left him one assist from current league leader Brad Davis of Houston. 

Pairing Mike Magee and Adam Cristman, Bruce Arena use a strike team that hadn't started together this season. It also allowed Landon Donovan to return to a midfield role. There's going to be another significant change going forward. Robbie Keane isn't likely to start, but he is available for tonight's match. 

 "We’re not as clean as we want to be in the last part of the field, not as dangerous, not as multi-dimensional as 

we need to be," Arena said. "We’d been looking to see if we could find another player we could add to the 

roster that has those qualities."

With their loss to Colorado, the Earthquakes broke their previous winless streak record. They had previously gone 10 games without a win, September 8th 2004 - April 16, 2005. The trip down to the Home Depot Center starts a stretch of nine games for San Jose where they'll play seven away from home. 

The Quakes did make a major acquisition for the stretch run, picking up striker Edmundo Zura, who was last with El Nacional in Equador. San Jose is currently shorthanded up top with Steven Lenhart still on a leave of absence, and former Galaxian Alan Gordon having just undergone surgery.