
How long will it be before Vanni Sartini changes the things that aren’t working? Will he change the things that aren’t working?
The inverted wing-backs, players at wing-back who aren’t wing-backs, constantly changing the personnel in the back three (in front of an inexperienced goalkeeper no less), playing two central midfielders who have no meaningful attacking intent.
Every game creates an unnecessary problem which then needs to be solved in the next.
Not that all the deficiencies fall on the head of the coach.
On Saturday the Portland Timbers purposefully slowed the game down at the start and the Whitecaps just let them do it. What should have been an opportunity to force the issue against a Timbers team who were out of form became another example of the Whitecaps allowing the opposition to dictate how the game was played.
They lack the on field leadership to recognize such problems and solve them on the fly.
A Roy Keane type figure or a Roy Kent or a Roy of the Rovers or a Rob Roy or a Logan Roy or a Roy Orbison or a…..look just sign somebody named Roy!
I don’t know how many times this has to be said, but only starting to play with purpose when you are two goals down isn’t a sign of character. It’s a sign of the absence of character.
Nor was Sartini helped by the clubs inability to improve the squad over the close season. The thinking seems to have been that the good run at the end of 2021 bought time to take stock when, in reality, it was the ideal time push forward.
Now we wait for the potential summer signing to provide the potential increase in quality that was needed four months earlier.
Three consecutive road games could see Vancouver looking down the barrel of another wasted season before May decides to make an appearance in the calendar.
So much time wasted by unforced errors in every department.
Time for the Soccer Shorts player ratings!
Hasal-4, Raposo-3, Dajome-3, Veselinovic-4.5, Jungwirth-4.5, Gutierrez-4.5, Berhalter-4, Teibert-2, Gauld-5*, Caicedo-4, White-4