Mezquida willing to put team first
WHITECAPS: Uruguayan one of team’s longest-tenured players thanks to his versatility
Given the choice, Nico Mezquida says he’d be a striker.
But the little Uruguayan also knows that what’s kept him a Whitecap since 2013 is his willingness to do anything, anywhere, at any time for his squad.
“Everyone knows what kind of player I am,” he said Wednesday after training.
The 26-year-old Uruguayan arrived in Vancouver at the beginning of 2014, Carl Robinson’s first season in charge. He was initially used as a winger, then saw time as an attacking midfielder.
Striker, though, is his preferred spot.
Most of his career to that point had been spent playing in his homeland, though there were a pair of brief loan stints in Norway and a short trial with Celtic in Scotland.
Still, nothing at the time suggested he was at the beginning of what’s now been a four-year stint with the Whitecaps, making him the third-longest tenured player in Vancouver after Russell Teibert and Erik Hurtado. There’s a common thread to the trio: All have proven to be players more than willing to play depth roles for Robinson, ready to play at a moment’s notice.
Most players come and go quickly in MLS. Just look at this past off-season, which has seen 17 players head out the door.
“In the first year, I thought I’d come for one year,” he admitted. “But I saw I really liked it.”
He played 14 times that first season, starting just four times and scoring twice.
But his role has only increased since. In Year 2, he made 18 league appearances. His career high in MLS are the 28 games he played in 2016. Last year, he got on the field 24 times.
In all, he’s made 81 appearances in his five MLS seasons, scoring nine goals.
Needless to say, he knows the opportunities will come.
“I’m here because I’ve got the support (from coaches),” he said. “Of course it means a lot for me.”
That support is why he can stomach not always being a first-choice
starter.
“Any player wants to play,” he said. But he looks around and sees how much competition there is at his position.
“Always, I’m ready.”
Last Saturday, he got his first start of the year as a second striker alongside Anthony Blondell.
Kendall Waston’s controversial red card early in the match turned the Caps’ plan on its head and Mezquida was subbed off at halftime.
“I knew it was for the good of the team ... the red card changed all our plans.”
It was a disappointment for him to see his team’s approach forcibly thrown out the window. Playing up top is where he likes to be, after all.
“To be a striker. To be high (up the pitch) with the ball,” he said, when asked to pick his favoured position.
“I like moving, getting the ball ... if you check my stats, all my best games are when I get a lot of the ball.”
And, of course, like every player, his goal each year is simple.
“The goal is always to be better than last year. Last year we made the semifinal in the west. I would like to play in a conference final or obviously in a cup final. This is my goal.”
But first, there’s building the season with a new group of faces.
“We changed many players (from 2017),” he said. “But the goal stays the same. It’s a good group.”