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.

Oh yeah! we Played a Game Last Night!

So the Whitecaps played last night, and should have pulled off a victory had it not been for a fishy play at the end of the first half that saw Carolina be awarded a penalty in the dying seconds.

Carolina came out strong to start the first half put on a wee bit of pressure in the first five minutes but after that the first half was dominated by the Whitecaps playing with the ball in the Carolina end. Strong game all around for the caps as guys like Johnny Steele and Martin Nash consistently pushed the ball into the box with lovely service. In the 31st minute on one of these such runs up the field Johnny Steele played a lovely ball on to a streaking Zurab Tsiskaridze, as the defender caught up to the ball on the left wing, he struck a low hard cross into the box and Ansu Toure flicked a cheeky little back heel into the goal.

As the half was drawing to a close Carolina's keeper punted a ball out of his box and an airborne Tsiskaridze was undercut by a Railhawks player at half, the play continued on and eventually led to Nelson Akwari bowling over Carolina's Etienne Barbara in the 18 yard box. A penalty was awarded and Barbara converted on the free kick.

After that the best chances of the second half came from a Marcus Haber header in the 53rd minute and then another head by Phillipe Davies in the 65th. Not a whole lot else happened in the later stages, Doudou came in for Ansu, in a Toure for Toure substitution, only to be involved in a head on head collision almost immediately after entering the pitch.

A draw while not ideal still keeps the Caps on top of the table.

The next home game from the men will be on July 8th almost a month away! the Residency Team will play Friday and Sunday this week up at SFU I urge you to come up and check it out. I will be announcing the Friday game but will not be at the Sunday game so maybe you guys could keep ME updated on that one!

The Women's next game is at Mcleod Athletic Park in Langley, on June 27th. They will be facing The Pali Blues from Los Angeles. I would imagine we will finally get to see the recently signed Kara Lang, who will have just graduated from UCLA. She actually was a member of the Pali Blues last season so hopefully she will be able to knock a couple past her former club and win one for the good guys