Whitecaps’ ‘blood and thunder’ win all about the defence
The Vancouver Whitecaps will enter a significant match against a regional rival following their best defensive performance in two months.
The Whitecaps enhanced their quest for the playoffs Wednesday night with a 1-0 win over the Los Angeles Galaxy at the StubHub Center, and will face the Portland Timbers on Sunday at B.C. Place Stadium.
“Let’s make no doubt about it: It’s a real terrific result for us, and I think it’s a result we thoroughly deserved,” Whitecaps manager Carl Robinson said. “I think we defended very well, individually and collectively, which you need to do against a good L.A. team.”
The victory was just the second for the Whitecaps (8-7-3) against the Galaxy (6-9-4) on the road in team history and the third away from B.C. Place Stadium this season. It was also the first shutout since May 20, when they downed Sporting Kansas City 2-0 at home.
As a result, the Whitecaps join the Timbers and the Seattle Sounders in a three-way tie for fourth place in Major League Soccer’s Western Conference. All three lie within five points of firstplace Sporting Kansas City, but are only one ahead of the sixth-place San Jose Earthquakes. The Caps, however, have at least two games in hand on all of them, except Sporting KC.
“We’re already preparing for Portland,” Robinson said. “We know it’s a massive game. All the games we play in are feisty. There’s lots of action: goals, tackles, missed tackles, things like that.”
Goalkeeper David Ousted made four saves — including two agile stops to keep Los Angeles from scoring first — for his first shutout in months.
“The guys put their body on the line,” Ousted said, “blocking shots, clearing headers. Anytime you get a clean sheet in a place like (L.A.), you’ve done well.”
Robinson attributed his team’s defensive improvement to better discipline.
“If you concentrate and your mental side is right going into a game, you limit your mistakes and we did that,” he said. “(It’s) all the nitty gritty stuff — the second balls, the headers, the tracking runners. I made them aware of that before the game and even at halftime. When you’re tired, your mind stops working. When your mind stops working, you get lazy. When you get lazy, you’re done.”
Robinson also praised the ability of centre backs Tim Parker and Andrew Jacobson to nullify the Galaxy’s Giovani Dos Santos, Jack McBean and Romain Alessandrini, the club’s leading scorer. Jacobson replaced Kendall Waston, whom Costa Rica summoned for the CONCACAF Gold Cup.
“I think he and A.J. were commanding in the back against a very good team,” Robinson said in reference to Parker and Jacobson.
“You’ve got to deal with movement. You’ve got to deal with Jack and Gio popping into little holes, with Alessandrini popping in from the outside, as well. That’s not easy, but they took it on.”
Tony Tchani scored his second goal of the season in the 64th minute to culminate his most impressive game since joining the Whitecaps.
“‘Kerrsey’ said to me that he thinks that’s his best performance and I have to agree with him,” Robinson said, referring to goalkeeper coach Stewart Kerr.
“He put in a very strong, mature performance. But he can get better. I still want more, but the day I stop wanting more will be the day I will not be standing here talking.”
Christian Bolanos began the scoring sequence with a 38-yard free kick. Tchani, in the midst of a crowd of players, executed a low header from eight yards. The ball took a high hop that goalkeeper Brian Rowe tried to block while leaping, but the ball deflected off his left hand and inside the right post.
“(Jelle) Van Damme was the one marking me,” Tchani said about the Galaxy’s All-Star centre back.
“I knew that the way the ball was served, he wouldn’t get it. So I just peeled behind and I was free.”
Victory meant surviving the Galaxy’s sustained pressure, which started in the opening minutes. The Whitecaps escaped two early
opportunities for Los Angeles to move ahead. In the third minute, Jack McBean’s eight-yard header off Bradley Diallo’s aerial diagonal from the right flank missed the crossbar by less than two yards.
Ousted then frustrated the Galaxy in the 21st minute, when he sprawled to his left to deflect Alessandrini’s 13-yard line drive with his left hand.
Alessandrini had another chance to score the game’s first goal in the 32nd minute after he eluded Tchani and took a 16-yard shot. But Parker deflected the shot wide of the right post.
The Galaxy continued the pressure with two early chances in the second half. Jacobson blocked Alessandrini’s seven-yard shot from point-blank range in the 50th minute. Then one minute later, Ousted lunged to his right and used his right hand to deflect a short hop from Dave Romney’s 13-yard header away from the left post.
“It was a blood and thunder game,” Robinson said. “One that we really enjoyed.”
Whitecaps midfielder Nicolas Mezquida made his first start since May 30 and his first in a MLS match since April 8. The Uruguayan played 59 minutes before Yordy Reyna replaced him.
Mezquida suffered a high ankle sprain in that May match against the Montreal Impact in the Canadian Championship and returned to action July 1, when he played 39 minutes as a substitute against the Chicago Fire.