Tough Loss at Home Gives Cascadia Cup to Portland

Tonight's match at Swangard was one of the best games the 'Caps have played all season. The atmosphere in the stadium was incredible, it always seems to get that way when the visiting fans are good and loud. Many people will point the finger at the officials for the unfortunate result at tonight's game, some may even have the audacity to blame Greg Janicki, for taking a red on a poor tackle on the leagues leading scorer. Janicki was running hard to catch Ryan Pore who was sprung on a breakaway he then cut across right to left and got Janicki to make contact and he dropped like a sack of potatoes.

It is always tough to blame the refs because they aren't really playing the game but they surely had an impact on the evenings fixture. There were a couple of questionable calls or even non calls for that matter. Including a Portland hand ball in their own box and a penalty was given to Ryan Pore, even though upon further review you can see that Pore wasn't actually in the box when the foul occured. Jay Nolly sprawled out to make the save but just missed a perfectly placed ball. A few minutes later Nolly ended up getting caught out on a crossed ball and after a bit of a scramble Portland was able to hammer home the winning goal. But lets try to focus on the positives here because there were lots of them tonight.

Nizar Khalfan had a heck of a game up front creating all kinds of chances as did Cornelius Stewart. Khalfan took advantage of a fortunate cross for Phillipe Davies in the first half and blasted a shot to the short side on Portland's keeper to give the Whitecaps a lead early in the second half. Dispite what I would refer to as his only mistake this year, Jay Nolly made a couple of brilliant saves, as we have come to expect from him this year. The usual supects on the back line all had strong games and same up the middle.

It was a tough loss but you can't win them all... or even tie them all too bad our first home loss of the season had to come to the hated Portscum Timbers. I guess they were due seeing as they hadn't won at Swangard in 6 years. Tomorrow I am supposed to be getting my burger from Malould Akloul, he says just a burger no frosty, it was worth a shot to try.