Real Salt Lake owner feels 'disrespected' by player strikes, refusal to play

As part of athlete strikes seen throughout the United States in the wake of the shooting of Jacob Blake, footballers from Major League Soccer clubs Real Salt Lake and LAFC elected to not play a scheduled regular-season fixture on Wednesday evening.

RSL owner Dell Loy Hansen hit out at the strike on Thursday morning.

As Alex Vejar of the Salt Lake Tribune wrote, Hansen spoke about his players' actions on the X96 "Radio From Hell" program.

“It’s a moment of sadness. It’s like someone stabbed you and then you’re trying to figure out a way to pull the knife out and move forward. That’s what it feels like. The disrespect was profound to me personally.

“Obviously the importance of bringing community together during COVID was not respected," Hansen added. 

Additionally, Hansen threatened to cut jobs previously endangered due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic and to withdraw investment in the club.

"We will not be inviting fans back to the stadium in the future, so tomorrow ... I start cutting 40 to 50 jobs again. We would not go through the risk of inviting people back to have that kind of an outcome.

"It’s taken a lot of wind out of my sails, what effort I want to put into recruiting players, and building a great team. It just seems that’s not a very good path to take.”

Toronto FC and United States Men's National Team striker Jozy Altidore hinted that he's ready to take the club off Hansen's hands.