Match Recap & Highlights: Vancouver Whitecaps 1 - 0 Portland Timbers
Match Recap & Highlights: Vancouver Whitecaps 1 - 0 Portland Timbers
Portland is punchless and pitiful as they fall to the Whitecaps at BC Place.
The Portland Timbers fell 1-0 to the Vancouver Whitecaps at BC Place Saturday night, starting off their Cascadia Cup defense with a face plant. Aljaz Ivacic and the Timbers backline did their best to keep Portland in it, but the rest of the squad only mustered two shots over the course of the match, neither of them on target. The loss dropped the Timbers to 12th place in the Western Conference, on just five points.
Recap
A week after an encouraging 1-1 draw in Texas, Giovanni Savarese again had to make his team selections while being hampered by injuries. Eryk Williamson was unavailable, and so Savarese opted to deploy a makeshift midfield of Diego Chara, Santiago Moreno, and Diego Gutierrez. Dairon Asprilla got his first start of the year, and 19-year-old Homegrown striker Tega Ikoba was given his first MLS start up top.
Justin Rasmussen was also given the start at left back over Claudio Bravo. Portland had a lot of firepower on their bench, as Evander and Franck Boli started the match in reserve.
With the traveling Timbers supporters deploying a “Our Green, Our Gold” tifo in the away end, the first Cascadia Cup match of 2023 got underway.
A choppy start to the game saw Vancouver win numerous corner kicks in quick succession, and it was also through two stellar saves from Aljaz Ivacic that the Timbers didn’t find themselves in an early hole.
The first half remained a choppy affair, with Portland being unable to hold onto the ball for any stretch of the opening frame. Vancouver controlled the lion’s share of possession and chances, putting four of their seven shots on goal. Portland could not muster a single shooting attempt of their own in the first half.
Still, as has been the tale so often over the past two seasons, Portland remained in the game by the grace of Ivacic’s gloves, which made some impressive stops. The two sides went into the locker rooms scoreless, despite the Timbers decidedly second-place on the field.
Savarese tried to change that at the start of the second half, as he introduced Evander and Jaroslaw Niezgoda into the fray in an attempt to help spark his side offensively.
The change… didn’t produce much, as Portland managed their first shot of the game an hour into proceedings.
Vancouver meanwhile continued to control proceedings, producing more highlight-reel saves out of Ivacic.
That control finally paid off for the hosts, as they found the back of the net in the 74th minute via Bran White, when he bundled home a cross from Julian Gressel after Portland couldn’t clear their lines.
Portland came the closest to scoring in the 80th minute when a powerful cross from Rasmussen found Mosquera under pressure at the far post. But the Colombian speedster wasn’t ready for it and skied his chance.
Portland didn’t really generate any kind of offense at all after conceding, and the game petered out with the Timbers never getting close to the goal. The full-time whistle blew, and the Timbers lost in Vancouver for the first time since 2019 in a punchless 1-0 defeat.
Highlights
4’ Big save Jazzy! Aljaz Ivacic was alert early in proceedings to react well to push over a stinging shot from Vite from distance.
7’ ANOTHER big save Jazzy! Portland was unable to clear their lines, and after multiple Vancouver corners Ivacic came up big yet again to save a point-blank header from Laborda.
22’ Laborda sent a header just over the bar, as the Whitecaps continued to press their early advantage.
28’ Vancouver was forced into an early change, replacing their reliable central midfielder Andres Cubas with Sebastian Berhalter after Cubas was shaken up after a big collision with Ikoba.
30’ Vancouver puts the ball in the net via Ranko Veselinovic after Ivacic parried away a shot from Julian Gressel, but the flag immediately went up, as Veselinovic as offside as the ball left Gressel’s foot.
39’ Tristan Blackmon was shown the game’s first yellow card for scything down Juan Mosquera, who was on a promising breakaway opportunity.
Halftime came after what was a sleepy half offensively for the Timbers, who didn’t record a shot and could not hold onto the ball for any real stretch of the first half. The only highlights of note were Ivacic’s saves, and they reflected the advantage Vancouver held in controlling proceedings in the first half.
The Timbers started the second half with two changes, as Jaroslaw Niezgoda replaced Ikoba and Evander made his return to the field as he replaced Gutierrez.
46’ Dario Zuparic was shown a yellow card for pulling down Ahmed on the break.
51’ Veselinovic had the ball in the net again, but just like last time he was denied after the play. After a discussion with his VAR, the referee ruled out the goal for a foul Veselinovic committed on Zuparic as the ball was swung in.
52’ Santiago Moreno was shown a yellow card for taking down a Vancouver attacker off on a promising breakaway.
58’ Jazzy again! He palmed away a close-range curler from Gressel to save Portland yet again.
60’ Portland registered their first shot of the match an hour into the game, when Santiago Moreno got on the end of an Evander free kick and had a curling attempt blocked.
65’ The Timbers made their second change, as Franck Boli replaced Asprilla.
71’ It’s. Still. Jazzy time. He made another great save, leaping to deny Gressel again, this time on a long-range attempt.
74’ Goal Vancouver 1-0. Like that wolf that just kept trying, the ‘Caps finally blew Portland’s house down. The Timbers couldn’t clear the ball out of their own box, and at the third time of asking Gressel whipped in a ball for Brian White, who finally beat Ivacic and knocked home the game’s opening goal.
In the wake of the goal, which featured yet another video review (after which the goal stood this time), Portland brought on David Ayala for Moreno.
80’ Justin Rasmussen broke loose on the left side, and fired in a cross with pace to Mosquera at the far post. The Colombian wasn’t quite ready for it, as he skied the cross over the net.
81’ A minute later, Mosquera was replaced by Nathan in the final roll of the dice by the Timbers.
88’ Ivacic had to palm over a wicked cross from Brown that looked like it may have had eyes for the goal.
90’ White was shown a yellow card for a bad foul.
90’+1 Ayala was next to go into the book, as he is shown a yellow card.
90’+3 Aaaand Berhalter went into the book for, you guessed it, a bad foul.
90’+6 Ivacic, reminding everybody that he was stellar on the night, made an excellent point-blank stop on Daiber Caicedo, who was through on goal one-on-one.
Portland couldn’t generate any fight back after conceding, and the whistle for full-time blew after seven minutes of stoppage time, with the Timbers on the losing end of a 1-0 scoreline.
Final Thoughts
After going through a nearly year-long stretch of scoring at least one goal in every league game they played, the Timbers have now been held scoreless in two of their last three games. And in the one game they did score a goal during that stretch, it came in second half stoppage time when Portland was throwing the kitchen sink at their opponent.
A true center forward who started at striker hasn’t scored for the Timbers since Jaroslaw Niezgoda did in Minnesota way back in July of 2022, and that streak continued today. And that lack of offensive production is hurting the Timbers and losing them games.
I feel for Portland’s starting striker tonight, Tega Ikoba. Earning his first ever MLS start is a big accomplishment — but man it was a rough one. His forty-five minutes on the field saw Ikoba get muscled off the ball all too often. The 19-year-old’s instincts are good, and he sought to try to hold up play the best that he could, but the first half was a reminder that he is, well, still just a 19-year-old, with some development still left to do.
But let’s not pin Portland’s continued offensive inefficacy on the teenager. The Timbers still remain bereft of an attacking identity. As to be expected, the quality of their attacking play ticked up slightly after Evander came on, but Portland still just doesn’t have any kind of continuity, or frankly any chemistry, in their attacking play.
It’s a problem that Portland hasn’t addressed so far this season, and it bit them yet again tonight. Yes, Portland is still heavily hampered by injuries and doesn’t feel like a “full” squad at the moment. But the fact remains that Portland’s inability to consistently generate a threat on their opponent’s goal not only leads to them, y’know, not scoring goals, but it also puts pressure on every other part of the field.
And that pressure is something the Timbers currently cannot take. They now sit third from the bottom of the Western Conference, and don’t show many signs of climbing out of that hole any time soon.
The Timbers return home next week, when they face their biggest match of the season so far: hosting the Seattle Sounders at Providence Park. The game is set to kick off at 7:30 p.m. PT, streaming on MLS Season Pass on Apple TV.
Truly abysmal. Damnable waste of an evening.
Outside of our defensive 18 we were a void in a vacuum in deep space. Very disappointing performance.
Just play Ivacic against Seattle. Or maybe just send only Gio out of the locker room with a literal white flag instead of the figurative one he ran out with today.
Pathetic.
I’ve been fairly defensive of the team so far this year. But if they aren’t going to make Vancouver defend at all, I’m not going to either.
Gio has no idea what he's doing. He needs to go.
Niezgoda shouldn't be playing at all.
The players have skills but Gio can't figure out how to use them.
I love Moreno but he's been out of it the last few games and not sure why. I think he's one of the best in the league but something is not working with him.
Crime fighter McGraw is a Boss!
Mosquera is the real deal and i hope we keep him for awhile- he missed the shot but he's so good.
Boli and Evander look like they'll team up nice.
I'm gonna stop there with the players.
Terrible game but we have the skills if someone can get them out.
No more reactive defending.