Keeper Ousted leads ‘Caps to Dallas victory

April 24, 2016 at 9:50 pm | Posted in Vancouver Whitecaps, Vancouver Whitecaps 2016 | 5 Comments
Tags: Blas Perez, Carl Robinson, Dallas FC, David Ousted, Kekuta Manneh, Vancouver Whitecaps

It took a gargantuan performance by the Mad Dane David Ousted to lead the Vancouver Whitecaps out of the slump that felt like it would never end.  It is not often that a goalkeeper can lead a team so convincingly but Captain Ousted surely showed us all without doubt who deserves to wear the arm band.

A glorious 3-0 win over Dallas has hopefully put an end to a terrible run in form for the Whitecaps.

Coach Carl Robinson showed confidence in his under siege striker Octavio Rivero by starting him at striker.  I don’t blame him.  Masato Kudo has been very disappointing in all of the time he has been on the pitch so far this year.

Nico Mezquida was called up to be the midfield pivot in Robbo’s favoured 4-2-3-1 setup in the absence of Pedro Morales who was out front in the autograph booth.  I told my little Canadian Chilean friend Gaston who sits behind me that Morales was injured, to which he replied “AGAIN???” incredulously.  It was a feeling I shared.

The fact is that the Whitecaps have always struggled without Morales, the most talented man in our squad, but this match showed they can play without him.  Manneh and Techera flanked Mezquida behind Rivero.  Jacobsen and Laba played in front of our back four of Aird, Parker, Waston and Harvey.

The first half was abysmal just like the match in Salt Lake.  The Whitecaps were ponderously slow in moving the ball around and lacked any creative ideas.

Dallas had three chances to score early in the match and only Ousted kept us in the match.  He stopped a steep angled drive, made himself big on a breakaway forcing the shooter to miss the net, and tipped a deadly accurate long volley over the crossbar.  If any of those had gone in it would have been hard for the Whitecaps to recover.  After his volley save, the Mad Dane got up and screamed at his team in his usual passionate way.  It had the effect desired as it seemed to inspire the Whitecaps to play better.

Just as we all complained about how Manneh has not looked himself this year, the little Gambian charged down the left side with the ball and crossed it from the deep left flank in to a dangerous spot in front of the Dallas goal.  Dallas keeper Chris Seitz dove out of his goal to push the ball away but the ball caromed off of his own defender back into his own net on 34 minutes.  It was the Whitecaps first goal from open play all season.  It took eight games to finally get one!

While Dallas put the ball in their own net, the goal proved that in order to score goals a team needs to put the other team under pressure, which the Whitecaps have not been doing consistently since the start of last season.

Early in the second half Ousted made another astonishing save from a point blank shot.  Ousted must have studied his compatriot Peter Schmeichel, who used the handball ‘keeper “star jump” for desperate point blank saves.  Ousted executed the star jump to perfection and his outstretched hand barely saved Dallas from drawing level.  Ousted later made yet another fine save from a long range effort.

Two thirds the way through this match the Whitecaps earned themselves a corner kick.  Techera hit a left footed in-swinging cross which was clumsily cleared straight to Jordan Harvey who lurked on the penalty stop. Have took one touch to set the ball up and fired the ball into the lower left hand corner.  It was Harvey’s second of the year and perhaps he will re-gain his old moniker “Goal King Harvey” again.

With 15 minutes left in the match Robbo took Rivero off after another hard working but goalless performance.  Blas Perez came on for him to haunt his old Dallas teammates.  Perez played his usual physical game knocking his old friends to the ground so many times referee Petrescu took exception and gave him a yellow.

Techera and Perez created the Whitecaps third goal with fifteen minutes to go from a defensive throw in down the left hand side of the pitch.  Techera headed the ball on to Perez, who deftly flicked the ball over the last defender for the speedy Manneh to run on to.  Manneh finished with his first touch through the legs of the on rushing Seitz.  The ball slowly made its way into the net and victory was confirmed.

Kekuta Manneh, having scored a goal and created one as well, finally had a good match and showed the quality we all know he has.  He looked dangerous all night. Techera also stepped up and looked more like himself.

The Whitecaps second half performance was much improved. Coach Robbo must have given the players an inspiring speech during half time tea.

Let there be no doubt who won this match for us, however: It was David Ousted.  The statistics reflect he made only four saves, but they were all big match winners.  No one has been feeling the burden of the Whitecaps poor form recently than the big goalkeeper, and he has personally taken responsibility to turn the situation around.

With Morales absent yet again, isn’t it time to give ousted the captains armband for good?