You know things are really bad when a 4-0 defeat leaves you thinking, “Hmm, that was a little bit better actually.”
Not that there was anything all that good about the Vancouver Whitecaps loss to the New England Revolution on Wednesday evening, but there was at least a spell in the second half when they looked interested in scoring a goal and in which Hwang In-Beom showed flashes of the player he can be.
All quick first passes and incisive balls forward.
On another day (in another season maybe) Theo Bair’s shot in the early stages of the second half would have crept just inside the post instead of bouncing away from the goal and the game would have been a different story.
But it hasn’t been the Whitecaps day in a long, long time and this is very much not going to be their season so the shot stayed out and Vancouver huffed and puffed but couldn’t blow the Revolution down and a late flurry of goals gave the scoreline a very one sided look.
But that’s because, taken in the round, it was a very one sided game.
With the Whitecaps surpassing themselves in terms of lack of ambition in the first half as they conceded a gazillion shots against to zero for.
Zero shots!
Teams do better than that when they are playing the likes of Barcelona and Manchester City.
And this mini revival theme after going behind is becoming a little wearing. Either step up from the start or don’t bother stepping up at all.
But perhaps the only good thing about this recent cataclysmic series of results is that it may even persuade the vacuous and insipid souls who haunt the corridors of the Whitecaps Front Office to do more than mouth platitudes and live their lives as something akin to a permanent shrug of indifference that something needs to change and that that something has to be more than taking a chance on the type of player who once looked good when he played eight games in the Belgian top tier in 2013.
We shouldn’t hold our breath in that regard, but you would need a heart of stone and a brain of bone not to see that this squad needs more than just a tune up.
Like I said, don’t hold your breath.
Next up it’s the bang in form Earthquakes, followed by a nerve shredding home game against Cavalry FC and then three tough road games.
So the situation just isn’t going to get better quickly no matter what happens off the field.
You know how else you can tell things are really bad?
The team concede four goals and the goalkeeper is their best player.
Time for the Soccer Shorts player ratings!
Crepeau-6*, Nerwinski-3, Sutter-3, Cornelius-4.5, Godoy-5, Rose-4.5, In-Beom-5.5, Teibert-3, Venuto-4.5, Reyna-4, Bair-4 (Lass-3.5, Montero-3)
Soccer Shorts (The Director's Cut) 