Caps’ pre- season loss only means more fine- tuning needed
Pre- season scrimmages are the horoscopes of the soccer world.
What, at first reading, seems to be a coherent narrative that can tell you something about the future turns out to be a load of nonsense containing no predictive value whatsoever.
So when the Vancouver Whitecaps lost 2- 1 to Seattle in what amounted to a kickaround designed to improve fitness and introduce players to the rudiments of the new coach’s system, we do well to take the importance of that Major League Soccer exhibition result with a shovel full of salt.
Fortunately, unlike horoscopes, there is still the odd glimmer of light that such a game can shed on what is to come and seeing the Whitecaps adopt a 4- 2- 3- 1 system at least gave us a clue as to what players may be best suited to what roles.
For example, playing Nigel Reo- Coker and Russell Teibert as the two defensive midfielders is a long shot but it might just work, and there is certainly value in having a naturally right- footed and naturally left- footed player playing in tandem.
Both are capable of getting forward with the ball and both are also capable of providing temporary cover if the fullbacks make forays up field. Whether they both ( and Teibert in particular) have the necessary positional awareness to fill the role is something that coach Carl Robinson must surely be looking to establish during the pre- season.
Another interesting point to ponder is whether Robinson would have opted for a lone striker if Camilo Sanvezzo had still been with the club. The Brazilian could hold the ball up well enough to make a reasonable stab at the position but it’s doubtful that it would have made the best use of his goalscoring abilities.
During the game against Seattle, both Erik Hurtado and Darren Mattocks took turns as the most forward player and both showed flashes of the positives they can bring to the role in the form of pace, as well as the negatives in the form of lack of composure when it came to the finishing touch.
The absence of injured Kenny Miller probably means that one of these two will get the start in the early games, but the ideal lone striker is one who is happy to play with his back to goal and link up with other players, but both Hurtado and Mattocks prefer to play facing the goal and making runs in behind the opposition back- line and that makes combination between the forward and the midfield so much harder to achieve.
If former No. 1 pick Omar Salgado, still just 20 years old, can rediscover his fitness and his form then he may be the answer to the problem, but that is a big if for a player who has spent so much time on the sidelines because of injury.
Who gets to play in the forward three is still up for grabs, and probably dependent on who impresses the coach during the next few weeks but what we can say is that the Whitecaps are not only a long way from being the finished article, they are also a long way from us knowing exactly what that finished article will look like.
With less than four weeks to go until the first game, that’s a concern for the fans, but must be an even bigger concern for the coach.