At the end of the day, it’s not ideal for our marketplace. But we are part of a national league that games are played on Sundays. – RSL President Bill Manning

SANDY — Sunday is the Sabbath and a day of rest. But Sundays are also a business day for many. For Real Salt Lake and Major League Soccer, this is the case.

RSL will play its first Sunday home game of the season at Rio Tinto Stadium when it hosts Toronto FC in a nationally televised match on Fox Sports 1 at 5 p.m. on Sunday.

While many RSL fans are excited that their team is being showcased in the national spotlight, there are some fans who are not thrilled that Real Salt Lake is playing on Sunday.

Some in the community, in particular of LDS faith, having Real Salt Lake home games on Sundays conflicts with their religious beliefs. Some fans, including season ticket holders, have called RSL and said they will not attend Sunday home games. When the news was announced in January, some RSL fans went on social media and blogs, including RSL Soapbox's Facebook page, to post their displeasure:

“This is sad for Real Salt Lake. I want all matches at the RioT to be sell outs. Why schedule Sunday home matches. Are you trying to split the RSL Family?”

“Count me out!!! It is me and my kids that fill your seats.”

“It's unfortunate.”

“It's just disappointing and I believe I'm allowed to be disappointed.”

There was even a Change.org petition recently created entitled, “No Sunday Matches at the RioT.” The petition states that, "As supporters of Real Salt Lake we want to support religious observance and the deep tradition we have created at the RioT to have no Sunday matches at the Riot."

RSL President Bill Manning told the Deseret News on Tuesday that he recognizes that home games on Sundays has some RSL fans of LDS faith upset and/or disappointed, and hopes those not pleased can understand that RSL not only has a responsibility to the fans, but also to MLS and its broadcasters as well.

“At the end of the day, it’s not ideal for our marketplace. But we are part of a national league that games are played on Sundays,” he said. “It’s broadcast to the rest of the country. There is part of us of that is proud of what we do here, and we want to show the rest of the country what we do and who we are.

“(MLS) signed this new TV deal with ESPN and Fox, and part of it was to have destination viewing: Sunday soccer. The first three weekends (of nationally televised games) has turned out to be good; ratings are good. It’s been very good for our league and very visible.”

When RSL was approached to have some of its games on Sundays, the original plan by Major League Soccer was to have RSL host six home games on the Sunday schedule. “I had some concerns about that, and voiced them with the league.”

RSL was able to get Sunday games down from six to two, but MLS was in tough spot, Manning said, and asked the club to pick up one more home game.

After Sunday’s game, Real Salt Lake will play two more games on Sundays this season: June 7 vs. Colorado Rapids and June 21 vs. Sporting Kansas City. RSL will play four road Sunday games this season.

When asked about the feedback when the home Sunday games were announced, Manning said RSL has had a lot of people for whom it’s not an issue and a few have called who say it's an issue for them.

For the most part, fans who will not attend Real Salt Lake games on Sunday due to their personal beliefs have been understanding of the issue.

“What I’ve been so impressed with is when I talk to someone that is maybe a little bit more hardcore on beliefs and not attending games on Sundays,” said Manning. When you explain to them why, at the end of the day — with the exception of one, and I’ve talked to probably about a dozen people on the phone — they’ve all said, ‘Hey, I get it. You’re part of something big. You’re part of a national league. This is what we believe in. I’m still not going to go, but I’m going to give my tickets to my next door neighbor or my friend at work.’ ”

Manning says it’s not an easy decision for some fans to make. He also confirmed that having no Sunday home games for RSL was not a possibility. “That was not an option to the league. At the end of the day, we had to take on some games. Would I have preferred two games? Probably yes.” Manning also acknowledged that RSL having Sunday games be road games only — a model the Utah Jazz have had for many years — was not an option for MLS.

“We value every fan we have and every season-ticket holder we have, but it’s a choice. They have a choice to purchase our tickets. We have lots of fans saying, ‘This isn’t a big deal for me,’ too. We have the utmost respect for people’s religious beliefs.”

An option for those RSL ticket holders who cannot or choose not to attend RSL Sunday home games is to donate them to charity. “The Midvale Road Home is a place that we’ve talk to and they have a number of families that would love to come out to the game,” said Manning.

Season ticket holders can bring their tickets to Rio Tinto Stadium where the tickets will be donated. Another option is for ticket holders to sell their tickets on Flash Seats. “I had one women who I spoke to who didn’t know she could do that,” Manning said. “She emailed me back saying, ‘I made money!’

“At the end of the day, there are still ways to respect your faith but also have the tickets go to good use,” Manning said about donating tickets to others. “It may be a neighbor. It may be someone you work with who is of a different faith who would like to go to a game and you have the means to say, ‘Here are four tickets to the game, be my guest.’ And that makes you feel pretty good sometimes.”

The national spotlight will be on Real Salt Lake on Sunday against Toronto FC, something everyone at RSL is looking forward to.

“I love it,” said Manning. “I think it’s great to showcase who we are. It’s an opportunity for us to be on the same stage with some of the bigger markets, which I think for Utah is important. We’ve kind of always been the little engine that could. We are a small market, but we do not act like a small-market team. Our revenue base is strong, our fan base is strong, and we want to show the rest of the country that. We don’t want to be the best-kept secret here and no one else across the country knows about us. We’re pretty proud of what RSL has done in Utah.”

If Real Salt Lake does well both on the pitch and in the ratings, there is a possibility that MLS could ask Real Salt Lake to host more Sunday games next season — something Manning would be hesitant to accept.

“I don’t know if I have an appetite for more than three RSL home games on Sundays. Maybe it turns out to be a great thing for Real Salt Lake and the state of Utah. But right now, I don’t have an appetite for more than three.”

For Manning and Real Salt Lake, the prospect of Sunday games becoming more frequent in the future is something neither he nor the club is considering for the sake of the fans and their religious beliefs.

“We now have a season ticket package with 20 games, and I don’t want someone at home saying, ‘I love Real Salt Lake. I’m also loyal to my church and now they have six, seven (home Sunday) games.’ I really am hopeful someone doesn’t have to make that decision because there are a lot bigger things than Real Salt Lake and I appreciate that. You don’t ever want to put someone in a situation like that.”

Xoel CÀrdenas is a writer with Deseret News sports. He is also a columnist at SB Nation, the largest sports blog site in the country, where he covers FC Barcelona. Follow him on Twitter @XoelCardenas.