Disappointing. That would be the calm, sedated description of the Whitecaps performance in Dallas on Saturday night.
There are a few more choice words I'm sure many of us would choose to use instead.
Not sure how much point there is in just picking over the game in Dallas. The problems lie much deeper than just that one game, bizarre team selection apart.
Things are not quite right on the good ship Whitecaps right now and it's hard to pinpoint exactly what's behind it. We're not exactly at a Titanic moment in the season, but there is word that there are icebergs up ahead. So will Martin Rennie change course?
[PRBREAK][/PRBREAK]
Despite playing poorly in many game so far this season, the Caps haven't been cast adrift. We've only just fallen out of the top five and are three points off second place. So although no panic buttons should be getting pushed quite yet, there are things which have to be addressed and quickly.
We're keeping in the mix whilst not playing to our best. That is the one positive in all of this and I can take the many tinkerings of Rennie early on in the season, and the bad run that goes with it, if it means that he gets the right starting eleven together to guide us on a strong run soon after.
Does he have such a set of players at his disposal though?
There is a logjam in the West that is unlikely to be cleared till very late in the season and I wouldn't be surprised to see everyone beating everyone else all season long, keeping it tight till even the final weekend for some of the playoff places. Let's just hope the Caps are still hanging in there at that point.
It would be great for MLS from an excitement point of view for such an ending to the season. Not so good for the fans from a fingernail one.
It's undoubtedly a more competitive Western Conference this season. But are the Caps a more competitive side?
There's been a lot of backlash to the defeat on Saturday and in particular a lot of questions have been asked around Rennie's team selections and tactics by more than just a few noisy bloggers.
It's about time.
There's too many questions to try and address as to where things are starting to unravel in Vancouver, but we can look at some of them.
Is it that the current squad is simply not good enough? Is the depth not as deep as we all thought just a few weeks ago? Has Kenny Miller become a talismanic figure that we're missing badly?
Or do we need to look beyond the players and start to question Rennie as a manager?
I think it's a bit of all that but ultimately, the tactics being played out in many games, especially away ones, are simply not working.
Rennie's solution always seem to be to change the personnel and not the tactics. At some point he needs to wake up and realise that his tactics on the road since he came to Vancouver are where a bulk of the problems lie.
He is clearly easy to read by opposing coaches. Not so much in his team selections, which carry an air of being decided by spinning a roulette wheel at times, but in the way that his team will play, no matter who is in it.
I had no problem with dropping Koffie, Kobayashi and Mattocks in recent games. They've shown the odd little piece of magic here and there but have generally been poor.
I was confident from what we'd seen pre-season that our depth was good for such situations, but I was then raising the alarm bells early when we <a href="http://www.canadiansoccernews.com/content.php?4318-Whitecaps-out-of-their-depth-in-UBC-schooling" target="_blank"><u>lost a reserve game with UBC</u></a>. Some of the guys have moved on since that match but still, other teams seem to have a lot better depth to call upon than we are showing right now.
The other problem, which we complained about so many times last season, is that the team then seem unable to change and get themselves back in the game when they fall behind on the road. As soon as the opposition takes the lead, you may as well just go and put the kettle on.
It's not just the away games that are the problem, and we'll see if the team can regroup for their second chance at Dallas this weekend at BC Place.
He has reiterated post Dallas that he needs the team to become difficult to break down again. That doesn't just mean play more defensively, but it will be a part of it, so if you were expecting away games to get any more exciting any time soon, then you're likely to be disappointed.
Are the current players capable of playing to that system? Or are they just not good enough to compete in general? Some of the defensive play in the team is lacking to say the least.
If he really wants to be hard to break down again then he needs to bring in another centrehalf asap and try and find out why Alain Rochat's defensive form has gone to pot.
He also needs to work with the likes of Hurtado on their touch, if that is possible, or put in players who won't give the ball away so cheaply.
All that counts for nothing of course if we don't have players that can actually get shots on target first and foremost, but ultimately into the back of the net.
For all of Rennie's faults in his rigid tactics and formations, he is being let down by the players.
He is right to take a look at all the players in the squad. The only way to know if they're the right ones for the battle ahead is to blood them early.
You have to question making so many changes to a front line as he did in Dallas. The team that finished the match is pretty much the team that probably should have started it.
That was a game for more experience and skill like Camilo and Mattocks up top, not whatever kind of match ups he had in his head with the Dallas players.
Many players coming in seem not to be capable or ready for the challenge and are not seizing the chances being given to them, whilst regular starters are struggling and losing form.
Some will argue that a little break here and there and we would have more than eight points. Very true. Every team can say that. We can also argue that a little break here or there against us and poorer form from Joe Cannon and we'd be bottom of the heap right now.
The next three games are a chance for the players to show Rennie that they deserve to be with this squad past the summer. The Edmonton games in particular are the chance for some players to show they should be in the starting eleven.
Who will take that opportunity? Anybody?
It's in all of the player's hands now to shape up or ship out. And if things don't change soon, that will also be directed at the management as well.
Not making the playoffs would be a backwards step, but if we improved our win numbers and narrowly missed out, but won the Voyageurs Cup and did well in the Champions League, I would just about take that as a season of success.
Many wouldn't. Especially the mainstream media in Vancouver that see the playoffs as the be all and end all of things.
Both goals shouldn't be mutually exclusive either.
Achieve neither and it has to be seen as a failure. No ifs. No buts. No spin.
I said a couple of week ago on the podcast that this current squad is not good enough to take us to the playoffs and we need to add a few key players (ideally before the current transfer window closes but that may not be contractually possible). I also see Montreal as favourites for the V's Cup. So a LOT of work for the Caps to do.
Nothing I have seen since then has made me change my mind and only entrenched my view further.
Prove me wrong guys.
'Mon the Caps
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