A Scouting Report & a Tease

Even your mom thinks I'm cool.

It’s not often that one gets to scout both teams that yer local team will play in the play-in they are doomed to play. And yet that’s exactly what happened when the Vancouver Whitecaps hosted Minnesota United FC and let them steal dinner with a 0-1 loss.

Most of the notes below point to Vancouver more than the Loons and, yes, that’s me hedging toward the ‘Caps as the Portland Timbers’ likeliest opposition for the play-in. Hot take. Yeah. At any rate, watching…about 75 minutes of this game dredged up thoughts and memories about both teams, and I’m going to lace those the post below. To be clear, I am familiar with both teams, as well as most of the players that line up for them, but I won’t pretend to I know either of them.

That doesn’t mean I haven’t done obsessive (unhinged) stuff all season to help me keep tabs on every team in Major League Soccer. No, you're the weirdo with the Word doc you created to track the progress of all 29 teams in the league because the Form Guide (hallelujah!) fell short of truly connecting you to the data. Not me, not this winner. That said, if I was that guy, I might have something like this just lying around.

Minnesota United FC
Record/Stats: 14-12-7, 49 pts., 54 gf, 48 ga (+6); home 6-6-4, away 8-6-3; 7th in West; 12th overall
Last 10 Results: LWLWWLWWTW
Venue:                HHHAAHAHAA (again, not laughing; H = home, A = away)
Decision Day Oppo: v STL

Vancouver Whitecaps
Record/Stats: 13-11-8, 47 pts., 50 gf, 45 ga (+5), home 6-6-4, away 7-5-4, 8th West, 14th overall
Last 10 Results:   WLWTWTLTLL
Venue:                  HHAHHAAHHH
Final Games: v LAFC, @ RSL

I’ll reference that below, but let’s start with:
Notes on the Game
As laid out above, Minnesota rode in to Vancouver on the (much) hotter streak, they hadn’t allowed a goal in 315 minutes coming in to the game and extended that to (carry the 1…) 405+ minutes at the ‘Caps’ expense, and they did that with Robin Lod, Kelvin “7 Goals in 7 Games” Yeboah, and reliable wingman Joseph Rosales on the bench, until the 58th minute. The game itself saw them literally double Vancouver for shots and run up the xG by a multiple of four. I wouldn’t note that if it didn’t pass the eye-test. Vancouver grasped toward goal – not always badly, either, and the two best chances I saw landed in the space where Juan David Mosquera defends (if/when the cross clears the far-side center back) - while Minnesota found real chances and put general pressure on the ‘Caps defense in a way the latter could barely defend and rarely replicate. I wouldn’t say the final score misrepresented the result, so much as I’d say Minnesota could have scored two goals while Vancouver…did their best.

It's all stray shit from here, a hiccupping stream of consciousness that signals something along the lines of, I’d prefer that the Timbers get Vancouver and I don’t think it matters much where they play them because Vancouver went on to confirm the doubts about them that I voiced back when the Timbers drew them 1-1 at BC Place at the beginning of their four-game homestand. Speaking of…

Have you seen this kids?

I Don’t See Vancouver Beating LAFC
And that was before the broadcast booth informed me they’d be missing six players courtesy of the international break when they host Los Angeles FC this Sunday – a list that merely starts with Ryan Gauld (such silky feet), btw. Also absent: Sam Adekugbe, Ali Ahmen, Andres Cubas, Pedro Vite and, attacking every-man Fafa Picault. For reference, that’s the starting defensive midfield, their first-choice (right?) starting wingbacks and…Picault. Very much related, the broadcast booth called the XI they fielded against Minnesota their best - a shout that sounds right/reasonable – and the ‘Caps do have respectable cover in players like Tristan Blackmon (they can push Matias Laborda high), Ryan Raposo, Seb Berhalter, and Levoante Johnson up top, but they’re still winless in five, their past three wins came against shit teams (e.g., v SKC, @ ATX, v SJ) and those wins account for all the shine in their 3-4-3 record over their past 10 games. It’s not impossible – i.e., before their late, decent three-game winning streak (@ CIN, v STL, @ SKC), LAFC won just one game in eight (@ SEA) – but, again, Vancouver hasn’t been good at home (6-6-4) and a lot of that stumbling is recent. The sum of that probably points to a draw, maybe even a goal-less one, which suits Portland just fine. Related…

Decision Day
The ‘Caps beating LAFC is the worst-case scenario for the Timbers. Any other result leaves the door open for the Timbers to host the play-in and turns Decision Day into a scramble between these three teams. Portland plays the Seattle Sounders, of course (and fuck ‘em), while Minnesota hosts St. Louis and Vancouver travels to Real Salt Lake. Inasmuch as I have my theories about all three matches – e.g., St. Louis has rallied admirably down the stretch, Portland has had Seattle’s number for a couple seasons now, and RSL wobbled hard enough down the stretch to invite a sobriety test – all three games/scenarios strike me as too close to call in anything but broad strokes – e.g., Seattle has won six of their last eight (some real ones too), St. Louis travels poorly, and RSL still has nine points on Vancouver. It’s pretty goddamn wild at the rougher end of the Western Conference table…

re Minnesota’s Late Success
On the one hand, yes, Minnesota have won six of their past 10 games, including four on the road (fwiw, they’re as good on the road as Vancouver, which make them both more “playoff-dangerous” than the Timbers), on the other, here are the teams they’ve beaten: v SJ, @ SJ, @ STL, @ SKC, v COL, @ VAN. Feel free to call that as you see it, but I’d call that run 60%-soft at a minimum.

Full Disclosure
I had intended on closing this post with some details on both teams – again, with the balance tilting toward Vancouver – but to park picking at those until I have just the one set of entrails to pick through, i.e., until the now-inevitable play-in game against whichever team Portland winds up facing. As such, I’ll save details like Vancouver’s essential opportunism and where it’s likely to strike (paging Juan David Mosquera), or what appears to be a new, improved Minnesota defense, and notes on the players how make that work for that preview post.

Then again, how often does one get a chance to see yer local team’s likely playoff, play-in opposition face off mere weeks before they get tagged into the tango?