Sounders staff look on grimly as the Whitecaps celebrate
by Steve Clare
Saturday’s match was possibly the most one sided Cascadia derby in the MLS era. The Whitecaps were superior in every position. Only some good timing and positioning from Brad Evans plus Stefan Frei’s post post prevented a bigger hammering.
You can make a case for Portland’s 3-0 win over Vancouver in August 2014, but that was a pretty even match until half time. The outcome last night was never in doubt from the moment Pa Modou Kah hooked the Whitecaps ahead early. In October 2012, Sounders routed Portland by the same score but the losers outshot their hosts and were competitive throughout.
To add to Vancouver’s sense of history, this was their 50th ever win over Seattle Sounders in the four decade history of rivalry – and probably their easiest. As a sidenote, this was the first time coach Carl Robinson had been able to field a starting XI for a second time. In their 22 previous games, they had fielded 22 different starting XIs.
Most impressive was that that they won this match with Mauro Rosales and DP Pedro Morales on the bench; a very deep bench in fact many of whom will appear on Wednesday to torment what remains of the Sounders roster.
The Whitecaps have pace, guile and creativity everywhere and they tackle back when they lose the ball. They are disciplined and their off ball movement is consistently good, which leads to fewer turnovers even when pressured. They also have the best goalkeeper in the league, not that you would know it from Saturday.
To add to the feeling of greater things to come, star player Octavio Rivero is slightly off his early season boil yet the team is still winning.
Michael McColl is MLSSoccer.com. He is upbeat about the side but warns of even better to come:
“It was a pleasing result and performance in many regards, but perhaps the most exciting aspect of it all is that they achieved it while not at full strength and with their attackers still not firing on all cylinders. With Mauro Rosales and Pedro Morales missing from the starting line-up and with Octavio Rivero still not refinding his explosive goalscoring form from earlier in the season, it is exciting to think just how good this Whitecaps side can be.
“There had been some concerns about depth but in recent weeks those that have come in and needed to step up have done so very well, especially defensively. If this team really clicks, then talk of a deep postseason run and even a MLS Cup appearance are not too far fetched.”
In Steven Beitashour and Jordan Harvey, they have two MLS stalwarts occupying the full back positions but, unlike their local rivals, would not lose sleep if either was absent. Christian Dean, Sam Adekugbe and Tim Parker are all adequate back ups in a pinch although Adekugbe began the season as first choice.
Kendall Waston has proven an excellent leader on the pitch, calming down younger players who lose focus and Kah, whisper it in Portland, has found an even better centre-half foil than he had with Futty Danso in the ‘Great Wall of Ghana’.
Steven Beitashour has proved part of a solid defence
Dean also adds versatility, having excelled against San Jose at left back and in the middle of the defence at Portland. Whitecaps are unbeaten while Adekugbe starts at left back and he may return on Wednesday from his ankle injury to add to Robinson’s choices.
Caps success has been largely down to incredible road form where they have 7 wins in 13 games and the only positive goal difference in the league
McColl explains how Caps’ tactics lead them to so many road wins:
“The Whitecaps seem to have found the perfect formula for winning on the road. Their fast, counter attacking play is made for such environments and their solid defensive core can soak up immense waves of pressure. There’s an argument that they should also play that way at home, where they have surprisingly struggled this year, but there’s always a pressure for the home team to entertain to put bums on seats.”
With further talent such as Russell Teibert, Darren Mattocks and Erik Hurtado only making the bench on Saturday, there is plenty of reason to think the forces could be juggled enough to triumph during a busy August, in which they will play 8 games. Further down the rotation are EPL veteran Robbie Earnshaw, teenagers Deybi Flores and Kianz Froese.
Kendall Waston has acted as a mature leader during tense moments in matches
Down the I-5 corridor, the mood is gloomier and some hard truths need to be told.
Seattle have to stop the injuries/referees/pitches/call ups excusathon, even if there’s a medium-sized minority who still swallow it hook, line and sinker and they tend to be the merchandise buyers and the loudest in twitter.
Every club has had absences. Sporting KC have played with up to seven first teamers absent, San Jose have lost their star DP for the season and Portland began the season without their three best players. The international absences from the Gold Cup were foreseeable, and an injury to a player of Obafemi Martins’ age (and workrate) has to be expected.
Only the Dempsey tantrum and Marco Pappa rehabilitation absences were not foreseeable and those wounds were self inflicted.
The answers lie elsewhere. Hindsight is a great ally, but the decision not to expand the squad in the off-season beyond the necessary replacement for DeAndre Yedlin now looks foolish.
Where the Caps were hyperactive adding Kah, Rivero, Flores, Diego Rodríguez, Cristian Techera and Waston, Sounders largely sat on their hands. Could that have been the belief that the current squad remained deep enough to retain the Supporters Shield, or (worse still), a desire to keep the wage budget down in case there was a strike? Did they miscalculate how good their youngsters would be when asked to step up a level?
They may have understandably assumed that after being ignored for the World Cup, there was no way the USA would recall Brad Evans for the Gold Cup.
Whatever their thinking was, their conclusions have not panned out.
As of this point in the transfer window, the squad is not deep enough in quantity in defence and forward, and not deep enough in quality in midfield. Osvaldo Alonso is having his worst season yet and Chad Marshall is approaching his first ever form slump. Both have performed at a very high level and they have earned the right for a slump.
Alonso’s body language has been askew recently and one can only speculate whether that is due to a physical or a mental issue. The Honey Badger is snarling less than he used to and that is not a good sign.
Clint Dempsey is not good enough to carry an average team regardless of the amount of money he’s being paid.
Readers should ask themselves how much hoopla would there be over a man with 184 games for Fulham and 29 for Spurs, were he not a US international. He won no trophies at his time in London. He’s obviously still a superstar in MLS, but some of the expectations of what he can achieve on his own are commensurate with his salary and his international exploits, not with reality and his record at club level.
Dempsey picked up a yellow for a foul in midfield
Photo: Matt Warso (Prost Amerika)
Sounders are indeed paying him handsomely but the disparity of salary is not condusive to a harmonious locker room, especially after his tantrum brought a 3 game suspension at a time he was available.
Sounders lost all three games and that began the current slump.
Dempsey went off script and earned that three game ban. To make things worse, it ended just in time for the Gold Cup. It cannot have sat well. If the highest paid worker in your company sabotaged the efforts of the team by an act of utter juvenility and petulance, can you honestly say team harmony would be unaffected?
It is possible to ascribe his seeming isolation to no-one on the team except Martins being good enough to get him the ball.
That could well be true, and if so would explain the strange return of Erik Friberg to a roster already stacked with mifielders. But it might not be the whole story.
Some see a change of coach as a quick answer. It’s worth considering.
Before the US Open Cup exit, Sounders were 9-4-2 at 1.95 points per game and a goal difference of 22-10. Voices crying for the dismissal of Sigi Schmid were as rare as an Arsenal fan with a personality, and all the talk was of a repeat Supporters Shield – and possibly, just possibly, the holy grail of an MLS Cup.
Sigi Schmid had won the Supporters Shield and now had led the team to a runaway 1st place in the league. He didn’t wake up one morning, eat a bad prawn cocktail and become a bad coach. Besides, those calling for his dismissal are yet to name an available affordable replacement who wouldn’t have to start at Square 1.
Peter Vermes is building a dynasty in Kansas City and just needs to carry on doing what he is doing until US Soccer and Jurgen Klinsmann tire of each other. Loyal as he is, he is unlikely to step away until his obvious successor Jimmy Nielsen is ready for the SKC job. Can Jesse Marsch walk in and turn things around without an enormous steep learning curve? Letting Brian Schmetzer take over and hoping for the best seems the best option, but doubts exist that he may be too nice to manage high profile well paid internationals who occasionally need shouted at.
Could Sounders look abroad?
All the evidence from the hires of Aron Winter and Marco Schällibaum suggests that complete outsiders are unlikely to succeed in this most unusual league, with all its quirks.
New blood is however needed and the fans have a right to demand it.
Sounders have the highest matchday income of all and I still feel their purpose is to win the MLS Cup but do so as cheaply as possible, rather than spend fans’ money putting out the best players available.
Whether you are a fan of recruiting well paid ex-EPL stars or not, it has been frustrating for fans to watch ambitious owners dole out large sums to hire Shaun Wright-Phillips, Steve Gerrard, Andrea Pirlo, Gio dos Santos, Frank Lampard, Sebastian Giovinco, Didier Drogba, Kaka and David Villa while Alonso is nudged over the DP barrier.
Steve Gerrard is among the clutch of highly paid new arrivals from European football
The new rule by which teams will be able to spend up to $500,000 on new players this season outside of their normal salary budget of $3.49 million allows clubs to add the equivalent of more high-earning players.
Each MLS club will receive $100,000 per year for the next five years ($500,000 total) in additional funds to invest in their roster outside of the player salary budget.
According to Doug McIntyre on ESPN:
“The new rule opens the door for a club such as LA Galaxy to pay Omar Gonzalez’s cap hit with these funds to get below the DP threshold, then add another big earner, such as Mexican national team star Giovani dos Santos”
Sounders fans expect a big name and have a right to after filling the club coffers so loyally for 7 years.
That said one new player cannot fix all and some of the cause of the disappointment needs to fall on those who have been given every advantage to grasp their opportunity. In 2015, that probably means Andy Rose and Lamar Neagle.
Neagle would normally struggle to get an extended run of starts, especially at forward. This was his chance to stake a claim and even make Dempsey tradeable (bringing so many great options elsewhere with the DP slot and the funds).
He hasn’t taken it and that frustrates, because fans know he has the ability and he has all the tools to be a club role model. However his finishing has not improved and that was always going to be vital in a squad where there were likely to be more chances up front than to break into a stacked midfield.
Rose needs to find his main purpose for being on the field. He should be a threat at set pieces – but hasn’t been. He is a midfield version of Zach Scott in some ways, in that you can bring him in off the bench (or to start the off game in a staff shortage) and he will do any job adequately.
However at his age, he needs to find a role he does better than anyone else. At 25, he is running out of time to settle. Long term, could he still be a defensive midfielder that barks at the ankles of the opponents’ creative talent? Or can he be a new Brad Evans, whose role is to ensure Sounders recycle possession when under pressure by going to be the man who receives and redistributes the football.
Cristian Roldan, Darwin Jones and Thomas deserve a little more time before anyone passes a verdict on them. All have been advanced beyond their readiness to compete at this level. The Brazilian is also adapting to a new league and a new country. If players are given tasks they are not yet equipped for, that is a failure of management not the player.
However, it is the fact that there are large gaps in quality between the natural starting XI and those who would replace them that should be the chief concern. Other than at left back, the drop in quality when a player is unavailable is generally too high and the squad too thin.
Most of the Caps bench would have walked into Seattle’s starting XI. That alone says a great deal.
