Stats What I’m Talking About 2011

2011 may have seen Vancouver Whitecaps with a static attack, but here’s AFTN’s 2011 Whitecaps Stat Attack!

I know, I know, I’m hearing the groans on a number of levels at that sentence.

I just love sporting stats though. Ironic for a site called Away From the Numbers!

They tell you so much and so little at the same time. If stats aren’t your thing, then now’s a good time to stop reading and go and make a cup of tea. Maybe also best to avoid our Metro column tomorrow!

This is now the third end of season round up we’ve done, and you’ll be glad to know it will be the last, as we now look forward, and onwards and upwards.

Looking at the Caps struggles this season, one question that needs to be asked is just where did it all go wrong?

It’s safe to say that the Caps final record didn’t read as many of us hoped and expected.

34 games played, just six wins, ten draws and a whopping eighteen losses, for final points total of 28 and last place in the League.

One by one, all of our goals disappeared the course of the season (no pun intended!) – winning our first Voyageurs Cup, making the playoffs, reclaiming the Cascadia Cup.

Even beating Toronto’s inaugural season totals fell short on a pro-rata basis by one win and one point.

It makes for dire reading, but, in terms of on-field performance, what was it that brought us to this low point in Whitecaps history?

Before the season started, the question everyone was asking was “where are the goals going to come from?”. Two home games in, and seven goals later, and we were wondering what we were even thinking about talking like that.

It was poncho time!

Unfortunately, as the season then went on, our fears came flooding back with sorry realization.

The longest we went without scoring was 332 minutes between June 25th and July 9th. That’s 3.7 games and a huge factor in why we were falling apart.

We also had a four game losing streak during that period, or five if you include the Canadian Championship loss to Toronto. I won’t add in the Man City game for six.

The Whitecaps “Player of the Year”, Camilo, did his best to help, finishing fifth in the league’s “Golden Boot” standings with 12 goals. When you consider that the Brazilian and Eric Hassli contributed 22 of the Caps’ league lowest 35 goals between them (63%), then you can see how heavily we relied on the two strikers.

If one, of both, of them were off their game, then the whole team suffered. It seemed rare that both of them were actually on fire at the same time.

Ten Caps players got on the scoresheet this year, but when the third highest is defender Alain Rochat with three, something is seriously lacking in our attacking depth.

Camilo also led the team in shots, with 83, of which 37 (45%) were on target.

Eric Hassli had four multi goal games, proving that when the Frenchman was hot, he was a handful, but when he blew cold, which was often, he was ineffective. That season ending streak of nine games without a goal would have been a killer if we’d anything of real value left to play for.

He did lead the league with three red cards though! His eight yellows saw him third behind David Beckham in the additional caution count.

Shipping 55 goals, the third worst in MLS this season, obviously didn’t help.

Joe Cannon had a 67% save percentage in his twenty games, and Jay Nolly 63% in his fourteen. Between them, they faced 160 shots on target in 34 games – 4.7 per game. They faced 491 shots altogether (second highest in the league), so it could have been a lot, lot worse!

Our goalies had six clean sheets between them, with Cannon leading the way with four.

And defence was meant to be our strong point!

To be fair, it was during Teitur’s brief time – his 12 games in charge saw us concede just 17 times, with nothing worse than a two goal defeat.

We competed well in most games this season. There were only a few hammerings along the way, and all of them came once Tommy Soehn had taken over.

Not making a comment on Soehn there, just stating a fact. As much as we’d like to throw Tommy under the bus, the Whitecaps problems have to be shared by many at the club, from the players up. You can’t pin all this onto just one man.

It took the Whitecaps until October to actually string back to back wins together and they never went more than two games undefeated over the course of the whole season.

In the 14 games that the Caps scored first, they went on to win six games, lose four and draw four. If the Caps conceded first, however, then it was a whole different story, failing to win any of the 18 games in which this happened and managing to only fight back for a draw four times.

There’s the missing heart and heads going down moment right there.

Likewise, if they were trailing at the half, as they were in eleven games this season, then forget about. Nine losses on those occasions.

We fought well in the middle of the park at times, but lacked bite and dig.

Gershon Koffie had the dubious honour of suffering the most fouls in the season, at 76. A mark of his talent and danger to the opposition, but we should counter that by adding that he committed the second most fouls in the league as well, with 58!

In the creative stakes, Davide Chiumiento was tied fifth for most assists, with nine, after leading that category in the early stages before falling away a little as the season went on.

And to think we were regularly told during this period that he wasn’t at full match fitness quite yet!

Was fitness in fact an overall key to our downfall, especially in defence?

We seemed to start games well. We only conceded six goals (11%) in the opening thirty minutes, over the course of the season. We scored twelve (34%).

There seemed to be two killer periods for us in matches.

That half hour before and after half time, saw us ship 25 goals (45%). Lack of concentration? Failure in mental dexterity? Poor motivational half time team talks?

To put that in context, LA Galaxy and Real Salt Lake conceded eight in that period, whereas we scored a league worst nine times.

The last fifteen minutes of matches was also a killer. 13 (24%) goals conceded at the death. We did score eight though, including that wonder finish against Kansas City, so we can’t blame tiredness too much. Subs not being introduced quickly enough or too little, too late perhaps.

So them’s the facts. Make of them what you will.

We all have our own thoughts on why this season was a disaster.

What is most important now is that we move forward together. Together in unison. From the fans to the front office.

We all want the same thing – a successful Vancouver Whitecaps FC.

Let’s all work together this off-season to make sure we get it.

Mon the Caps.

Vancouver Whitecaps End Of Season Review : What The Dickens?

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,
it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness,
it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity,
it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness,
it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair,
we had everything before us, we had nothing before us.”

Charles Dickens – “A Tale of Two Cities”

Vancouver Whitecaps inaugural Major League Soccer season has come to an end.

The fat lady didn’t so much sing on Saturday, as whimpered, and when pantomime villain Baldomero Toledo blew the final whistle, there were mixed feelings.

There was the relief that a season that promised so much, yet delivered so little, had finally come to an end. There was disappointment at finishing bottom of the heap. Tinged with the sadness were happy memories of the past seven months.

Then there was the final realisation that it was all over, and with nothing bar a few Under 18 Residency games to give us our Whitecaps fix over these coming months, the off-season malaise was already starting to sink in.

We were all on this ride together- fans, players, front office. We shared the highs. We shared the far more common lows. We laughed, we cried, we shouted, we shook our heads. We made some great new friends.

Football united us and made many new converts along the way.

“You are part of my existence, part of myself.” (“Great Expectations”)
When we started our new MLS journey back in March, I don’t think any of us could have predicted the twists and turns that lay ahead, both on and off the pitch.

No-one would have expected the class of 2011 to become the worst Vancouver Whitecaps team, results-wise, in our proud 37 year history. Never before have we finished overall bottom in a League and hopefully we never will again.

It was certainly a season to remember, and sadly not always for pleasurable reasons. This is AFTN’s review of the season that was. “I’m not going to tell you the story the way it happened. I’m going to tell it the way I remember it.” (“Great Expectations”).

Why has AFTN gone all Dickensian on you? We think it only fitting really, as the Whitecaps 2011 MLS season played out like something that would fit quite perfectly into the world of Charles Dickens.

Vancouver might not fill the role of Victorian London all that well, but we certainly suffered hard times in our battle of life in the “majors”.

When Southsiders and other fans gathered in The Lamplighter a few days before the season got underway, we had great expectations. The excitement was contagious, hopes were high, and probably the worst thing that could have happened was the thrashing we gave Toronto FC in the first game of the season at Empire Field.

Expectations were then even higher, but it proved to be quite the long voyage, with far too many speedbumps on the way. Instead of becoming the bright new lights in the Pacific northwest, we became the poor relation’s story. when it came to our Cascadian cousins, left well behind in terms of results, performances, atmosphere, marketing and just how the club was run in general.

We were in the unique position of having two home openers, in two differently wonderful stadiums. Both occasions were amongst the highlights of our season, but unfortunately, all too often there was a lot of hardship, as we begged for scraps. Those were two very bleak houses for most of the year.

Not as bleak as when we went into the houses of others mind you. No wins on our travels was more than just disappointing. It was embarrassing and infuriating at times. A lot of fans spent a lot of their hard earned time and money to watch some of the most lacklustre performances I have seen from a Whitecaps team on a football pitch.

Whereas other teams seemed to have fight, passion and a desire to win, we showed none of these far too often, with our heads going down way too easily when the going got invariably tough.

It wasn’t just two homes we had, we also had two managers, with another on the way.

Frankly, both managers were poor and fell short of what we needed to make any sort of impact in Major League Soccer this year. A tale of two shitties, if you will.

Neither of them got a squad of talented players performing at the level that they should have done.

This was not a poor squad. We are not a last place side with the talent we have on our books. We seriously underperformed.

The question as to why needs to be addressed at the very top.

All of this was overseen by our mutual friend, Paul Barber.

The little London stray seemed to be trying to do his best to encompass characters from Oliver Twist.

Artfully dodging the hard questions, with positive spins on the negative, that even a slippery politician would have been proud of. When fans complained about things like the drummers, ticket prices, Uniglobe, and other issues, there were always tales of more fans who were happy with everything and had taken the time to write and tell him that. How pleasing, yet unusual, in this day and age.

Despite the complaints, his band of ticketing urchins, front office and corporate sponsor, continued to pick a pocket or two from the fans, never afraid to be asking for more. It was enough to make Fagin proud.

But let us not just dwell on the bad times, for there were also many happy occasions.

The first two home games were simply remarkable – the TFC opener and the amazing three goal comeback draw against Kansas City. It may have gone downhill pretty fast after that, but at least we have those memories, and five other wins as well.

We had some stellar player performances, both in the first team and in the up and coming Residency players.

Camilo da Silva Sanvezzo was the player of the season. Although his going to ground became grating, his goals more than made up for that. Eric Hassli was sublime, when on his game, and the team woeful when he wasn’t, and he knew it.

Gershon Koffie showed maturity beyond his years and although he still has work to do on his game, he has a bright future, which will no doubt take him beyond MLS pretty soon. And Joe Cannon, won a crowd of Jay Nolly lovers over by being himself.

The brightest spots of the year were the promising young Canadian talent that is coming through. Caleb Clarke, Ben Fisk and Bryce Alderson all impressed in the PDL and got some minutes under their belt in the MLS Reserve League.

I await the day that they make the actual move to the first team squad. It will come.

And then we have the fans, and the atmosphere. Tremendous and a football crowd I never thought I’d experience in Vancouver.

“There is nothing in the world so irresistibly contagious as laughter and good humour” (A Christmas Carol)

The Southsiders led from the front, but the rest of the stadium were also so up from it from the first kick to the last. Now, if only we could actually get more people to actually be in their seats by kickoff time.

Fans got to experience some great awaydays. I personally took in the games at Chivas, Real Salt Lake, Seattle and Portland. Newxt year, I plan many more, and hopefully see our first ever MLS away win in the process.

These travels made me appreciate what we have in the stands in Vancouver, and also how wonderful it is to have a club that publishes a game specific (and free!) matchday program.

It’s these little things that make my football experience complete. Now, if we can only get a pie stand at BC Place…

It was a sad season in many ways, as supporters had to say farewell to some favourites. Players who had been with the Caps back in their D2 days were either kicked to the kerb or just simply ignored when Tom Soehn took over. More fan faves will leave before the year is out.

“There was a long hard time when I kept far from me the remembrance of what I had thrown away when I was quite ignorant of its worth.” (“Great Expectations”)

Wes Knight was treated most disgustingly, with the ultimate kick in the teeth for the player and the unhappy fans being when the club gave his still warm number 8 jersey to Peter Vagenas, for no apparent reason whatsoever at that late stage of the season.

If that was two fingers up to the fans, then it was joined by a huge middle finger at the weekend when Soehn didn’t just ignore the fans Twitter campaign to get Philippe Davies some playing time, he dropped the player from the gameday eighteen altogether.

“In a word, I was too cowardly to do what I knew to be right, as I had been too cowardly to avoid doing what I knew to be wrong.” (“Great Expectations”)
Mouloud Akloul was the player though that gave us a mystery of Edwin Drood proportions, when he seemed to just disappear off the face of the Whitecaps planet. All Soehn kept saying was that he was still on the Caps books, but his release was eventually announced. All was revealed last week when Akloul told MLS France, what AFTN had always suspected. Soehn was a prize twat and he had had a bust up with him.

I miss our crazy Frenchman, but at least we have two great goals to remember his Whitecaps career by and last season’s hilarious Timber Joey piss-take.

Unfortunately we are still stuck with Tommy Soehn. At least for now. We still live in hope.

With Soehn moving back upstairs to continue his reign of pain, there is at least some hope on the horizon, from the great Scot, Martin Rennie.

“The time will come, the time will not be long in coming, when new ties will be formed about you–ties that will bind you yet more tenderly and strongly to the home you so adorn–the dearest ties that will ever grace and gladden you.”
(“A Tale of Two Cities”)
We don’t want to heap too much pressure on Rennie, but with his track record of building attack minded teams that also have a heavy emphasis on defence, we expect nothing less than a playoff spot!

No pressure then for my fellow countryman.

He’s coming to us on the back of a horrible late season slump for his Carolina Railhawks.

Tainted by the hand of Soehn? We hope not and we hope that he’ll bounce back quickly.

He has a big job ahead of him but he has a good core of around 10-12 players that he can build around. He likes to build teams from a strong defensive footing and boy, are we badly needing that right now.

I have confidence in him to do the job, if he is left to do it in his own ways.

“The most important thing in life is to stop saying ‘I wish’ and start saying ‘I will.’ Consider nothing impossible, then treat possibilities as probabilities.”
(“David Copperfield”)
I think what Dickens was trying to say above was “I Believe”.

I Believe That We Will Win.

And despite this seasons letdowns and disappointments, I truly believe that we will be doing just that under Martin Rennie’s Vancouver Whitecaps.

It’s been a long season, but the hard work is only just starting.

Mon the Caps.

Timewasting: It’s Time For AFTN’s 2009 Awards

Happy 2010 to all our readers the world over.

We did our own personal round up of 2009 yesterday, depressing stuff that it was, so we thought we’d lighten the mood a little by looking at the highs and some lows of the last year awards style.

THE AFTN MATCH OF 2009:

Just talking about matches attended here and all the contenders are Vancouver Whitecaps related. The Puerto Rico match in the thunderstorm from hell in July holds memorable sway for non footballing reasons, but we can’t look past the amazing game that was the USL Semi Final second leg in Portland between the Timbers and the Caps. A pulsating 3-3 tie that saw the Caps advance to the final 4-3 on aggregate. It was perhaps the most exciting game I’ve ever attended.

THE AFTN AWAY TRIP OF 2009:

Not a lot to pick from but the trip we made down to Portland in August will long live with us. Presenting the Cascadia Cup on the pitch to the Timbers fans after the game was just unbelievable and the hospitality and welcome we got down there was how football should be and a credit to the Timbers Army.

AFTN’S FAVOURITE NEW GROUND:

Only two new grounds clocked up this year, but the hands down winner is AFC Wimbledon’s Cherry Red Records Stadium. Just walking in to the place in November filled us with joy. It’s a proper football ground, none of that legoland nonsense. It’s how football was meant to be and should be. I can’t wait for a return visit this year.

THE PLAYER WHO HAS IMPRESSED AFTN THE MOST:

This might be a surprise to some but we’ve been mightily impressed with Aston Villa’s Richard Dunne. He’s been phenomenal since his move from Man City just before the transfer window. Moneybags City might be rueing letting him go now with their defensive frailities. His passion and commitment to the claret and blue cause has been a joy to watch so far this season.

VILLAINS OF 2009:

The surrender monkeys of the Montreal Impact for their capitulation that let TFC steal the Canadian Championship, and the Concacaf Champions League place that went with it. Je Me Souviens. May you never make the MLS and rot in hell in backruptcy. Still at least we have a real hatred now going forward.

DICKHEAD OF 2009:

Like most years I really can’t see past David Beckham.

STORY THAT’S GIVEN US THE MOST JOY:

Burnley taking the Premiership by the scruff of the neck. Long may it continue.

Tomorrow, our awards of the decade past!