Report and Reaction: Five star Whitecaps find swagger in Portland playoff blowout

Report and Reaction: Five star Whitecaps find swagger in Portland playoff blowout

Posted on October 24, 2024 by in MLS, VANCOUVER WHITECAPS with 0 Comments

I don’t know where they’ve been hiding, but welcome back to the Vancouver Whitecaps we knew and loved a short few weeks ago. The road warriors returned in style, with a five star demolition of Portland Timbers in their MLS Wild Card game at Providence Park on Wednesday evening led by a dominant performance from Scottish DP’s Ryan Gauld and Stuart Armstrong.

A three-goal first half blitz and a further two in the second saw the ‘Caps run out 5-0 winners, matching their largest ever playoff win at home to San Jose in 2017. And it could have been more. Gauld grabbed a hat-trick and an assist, while Armstrong had one goal and two assists. Brian White also netted for the Whitecaps, who didn’t just send the league a message with the result, but one to themselves – reminding everyone what this team can be when fully fit and fully firing.

Vanni Sartini went with a strong, aggressive, attack-minded line-up and the 4-3-2-1 formation saw all three DPs get the start. And what a part they all played. Portland handed the start in goal to James Pantemis over his fellow Canadian Max Crepeau, and that will undoubtedly be a postgame talking point amongst the Timbers faithful.

Vancouver started the match very much in the ascendency, pressing Portland at every opportunity and keeping the home side on the back foot. The amount of turnovers from the Timbers in the first half was staggering, many of them forced by the ‘Caps, but many also just careless giveaways that Vancouver pounced upon.

Portland had the first real look on goal in the game, with Juan Mosquera forcing a save out of Yohei Takaoka in the 16th minute, but the ‘Caps immediately responded, with Pantemis parrying away a Gauld effort.

That just temporarily delayed the Scot, who opened the scoring 20 minutes in.

Portland had several attempts to clear the ball following an Armstrong corner and a subsequent scramble from it. Fafa Picault and Tristan Blackmon brought stops from Pantemis, but Gauld was on hand to finally fire home the rebound and the ‘Caps had the lead.

After that, there was no looking back for Vancouver and they extended their lead before half time, with some absolutely sublime bits of skill.

White made it 2-0 in the 24th minute.

Gauld whipped in a long ball that came through to Matias Laborda and the Uruguayan defender showed fantastic skill to control and flick the ball into space, but it back for a wide open White to sweep home from the edge of the six yard box.

Seven minutes later and the Whitecaps were in absolute dreamland as they grabbed a third.

This time is was Gauld with the superb finish, after starting the move by intercepting a backpass before delivering a cheeky little lob over Pantemis, who was caught in no-man’s land off his line.

Portland look shell-shocked but they did muster a couple of chances to end the half and remind Vancouver that they were still in the tie. Evander, who had been neutered by a strong ‘Caps defence, saw an effort tipped over in the 40th minute before David Ayala headed over a minute before the break.

The Timbers made three changes at the half, as Neville tried to get some kind of reaction from his team. One of those was Diego Chara, who had picked up an early booking and was very fortunate not to have got a second after a couple of rash challenges thereafter.

After some initial signs of life, the Whitecaps killed the game and the crowd stone dead in the 51st minute when they made it 4-0, as Picault whipped in a delicious cross for Armstrong and his bullet of a header was perfectly placed past Pantemis.

The Whitecaps went nap a minute before the hour mark, apt as the Timbers were seemingly sleeping for much of the match.

This time Armstrong turned provider, slipping a perfect pass inside for Gauld to tuck it away into the far corner and it was 5-0.

The rest of the match was a formality.

It was a stunning performance, especially from a team that was heading into the match winless in seven. They needed this confidence booster and the difference in this team with Gauld in it and without him was at the fore. Getting all their top guys out there, seeing them all contribute, and playing solidly defensively is what it’s going to take to see the Whitecaps make a postseason run.

There’s no denying that the Western Conference winning LAFC is a whole different animal, but after a performance like this, the mojo is back, the belief is back, and playoff season has very much begun. Roll on Sunday.

FINAL SCORE: Portland Timbers 0 – 5 Vancouver Whitecaps

ATT: 19,143

SCORING SUMMARY:
20’ – VAN – Ryan Gauld
24’ – VAN – Brian White (Mathías Laborda, Ryan Gauld)
31’ – VAN – Ryan Gauld (Stuart Armstrong, Pedro Vite)
51’ – VAN – Stuart Armstrong (Fafa Picault, Pedro Vite)
59’ – VAN – Ryan Gauld (Stuart Armstrong, Sam Adekugbe)

STATS:
Possession: VAN 46.5% – POR 53.5%
Shots: VAN 11 – POR 12
Shots on Goal: VAN 8 – POR 4
Saves: VAN 4 – POR 3
Fouls: VAN 13 – POR 7
Offsides: VAN 6 – POR 0
Corners: VAN 6 – POR 6

BOOKINGS:
23’ – POR – Diego Chara
54’ – VAN – Yohei Takaoka
69’ – POR – Evander
85’ – POR – Kamal Miller
85’ – VAN – Ryan Raposo

PORTLAND: James Pantemis; Juan Mosquera, Miguel Araujo, Dario Župarić (Kamal Miller 46′), Claudio Bravo (Santiago Moreno 46′); Diego Chara (Eryk Williamson 46′), David Ayala; Antony (Eric Miller 63’), Evander, Jonathan Rodríguez (Finn Surman 83’); Felipe Mora [Substitutes not used: Maxime Crépeau, Cristhian Paredes, Mason Toye, Marvin Loría]

VANCOUVER: Yohei Takaoka; Mathías Laborda, Ranko Veselinović, Tristan Blackmon, Sam Adekugbe; Pedro Vite, Andrés Cubas, Stuart Armstrong (Alessandro Schöpf 63’); Fafa Picault (Damir Kreilach 76’), Ryan Gauld;️ (Ryan Raposo 63’); Brian White (Levonte Johnson 63’) [Substitutes not used: Isaac Boehmer, Bjørn Inge Utvik, Sebastian Berhalter, Ali Ahmed, Déiber Caicedo]

REACTION:

VANCOUVER WHITECAPS

VANNI SARTINI

If he would have imagined such a dominant win in Portland:

“Well, maybe not 5-0, but I knew that we could play a very good game. We’re very happy, it was a fantastic game, and today everything went in the right direction. In the last two games, everything went in the wrong direction in terms of luck and half and half [chances], but today went all in our direction. So I think it evens out. I’m really happy because the guys up top did fantastic work, but it was made possible because of the work rate of everyone. It was really hard for them to break us and it was much easier for us to break them. That was the key of a result that looks easy, but it wasn’t easy.”

On what the secret ingredient was:

“The secret ingredient is when we’re all together and we believe, it’s really easy for everyone to get back through to the thing that we’re trying to do, in being confident. And also, we have a secret ingredient that is not a secret ingredient, and this ingredient is called Ryan Gauld. When Ryan Gauld leads the team like he does today, everything becomes easier for everyone else. And the performance that he put on today is massive. I don’t know in the history of the Whitecaps if there’s a performance better than this. I don’t know the entire history, but what he did today is astonishing.”

MIDFIELDER STUART ARMSTRONG

On Ryan Gauld’s stellar performance:

“When I knew him 10-11 years ago, he was a player of quality, producing assists and goals that were just different from others. Seeing him now, he’s grown as a player and as a person. He’s very mature, makes great decisions, is a leader of a team on and off the pitch. These examples that you see tonight, three beautiful, different goals. His work rate [as well], he has a lot of quality, technically, mentally and physically, and a real asset to the team. I’m not surprised to see him doing so well. I’ve always known that he’s had this huge amount of potential and talent. And to be a part of that, playing alongside him, is a joy.”

CAPTAIN RYAN GAULD

On sending a message to the league:

“I think more importantly it’s a message to ourselves about the quality we’ve got. We’ve been a little bit hit or miss over large periods of the season, but it’s a huge message within ourselves that when we’re at it and play at a high intensity, we’ve got the quality. We need to worry about ourselves and make sure that we take the confidence going forward.”

On taking momentum into LAFC:

“We have to, obviously with the game coming soon, we have to take what we can from this game and make sure that we use a lot of the same things and just try and imitate that performance as much as we can.”

      
Tags: , , , , , , , , , , ,
Authored by: Michael McColl

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.