Sunday, Oct. 20
NEW ENGLAND vs. LOS ANGELES (1:30pm ET).
at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Mass.
TV: ABC (live)
Key Players Out: New England – F Diego Serna (torn ACL & meniscus-L); Los Angeles – F Gavin Glinton (fractured ankle-L).
Referee: Kevin Terry.
FORMAT: If the game is tied after regulation time, two 15-minute periods of golden-goal overtime will be played. If the game is still tied, the winner will be decided by a penalty-kick shootout.
BIG QUESTION MARK: New England's Taylor Twellman remains questionable with a knee injury (MCL sprain) suffered in Game 2 of New England's semifinal series with Columbus. He sat out the Game 3 and trained on Thursday.
CROWD: About 45,000 tickets had been sold for by Thursday. The MLS Cup attendance record is 57,431. That mark was set in another home-team atmosphere when D.C. United defeated Colorado, 2-1, at RFK Stadium in 1997.
LUCKY NO. 4? Los Angeles reached the MLS final three times and lost each:
1996: 2-1 vs. D.C. United.
1999: 2-0 vs. D.C. United.
2001: 2-1 vs. San Jose.
New England did not advance past the first round of the playoffs in its two previous postseason appearances.