It is every coach and every fan's dream to find an undiscovered player on his way to stardom. Almost any serious soccer message board will have its stories of diamonds in the rough, "why don't we bring in this guy and see what he's got?" Everybody knows that real unexpected talents are one in a million, but nobody cares because the next player might be that one.

Poor Nick Dasovic is no exception.

Dasovic used Twitter in an attempt to reach out to Edmonton-born Arsenal youth prospect Jeffrey Monakana. Monakana is an 18-year-old wide midfielder who played last year's Dallas Cup and who the Arsenal website tells us "was a virtual ever-present for the Under-18s". Monakana has never featured for Canada's youth at any level.

Small wonder Dasovic was excited and tried and draw Monakana's attention. The problem, and the one geographically-inclined readers would have figured out by now, is that Monakana is from that other Edmonton. The one in North London after which Edmonton, Alberta was named. Famous London-Edmontonians include Paul Rodgers, but the former Newport defender and not the guy from Free. It's like they enjoy confusing everybody.

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How do you even talk about a game like that? My god, what a nightmare.

I'm told that, after the game, Martin Rennie went on a rant about the refereeing. Silviu Petrescu is from the Toronto area and called a shitty game, because he's a Canadian referee and therefore incompetent. If true, then I lost a little more respect for Martin Rennie because in a game like that you should never rely on the referee to win the game for you. Vancouver was totally, comprehensively out-played by an 0-0-9 time. They were beaten completely into the ground and deserved exactly what they got, which was nothing.

Sometimes I need to remind myself that Martin Rennie is learning about MLS every bit as much as some of his players. Because he's a bright guy who's having a good year and who got thoroughly outfoxed by Aron Winter. Winter simply set up a game plan to exploit the old weaknesses that everybody could see and was talking about: Vancouver can't do much of anything out wide and they can't move the ball through midfield without either Davide Chiumiento or Matt Watson playing. The Camilo Sanvezzo - Eric Hassli - Sebastien Le Toux strike trio might be our three most talented forwards, but they also don't play well together.

The result? Self-explanatory. An absolute disgrace.

Most of the players put in a fair effort. For all the heat Eric Hassli's going to get for sitting down in bewildered shock after not having a foul called from a tough Adrian Cann tackle, at least he cared even if he wasn't thinking. All the guys whose effort is sometimes questionable ran their hearts out, while Joe Cannon's rampaging up and down the field in garbage time will be remembered as long as people want to think about determination not to accept a loss.

They just played awful soccer and deserved to lose to an inferior team, thus handing over a national championship which the Whitecaps have still never won and forfeiting a fantastic shot at their first trip to the CONCACAF Champions League. So, even as I accept that the boys tried their best, I'm still angry at them for playing so poorly in the most important game we're likely to play all season. It's not rational, but fandom never is.

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Winning the Voyageurs Cup is the only thing that matters.

It matters because the Voyageurs Cup is the Vancouver Whitecaps' only ticket to the CONCACAF Champions League. Remember when Toronto FC and the Montreal Impact both had runs to the knockout stages and their fans got to smirk and say "are we Canada's team yet?" like arrogant bastards? I want to be that arrogant bastard. I want to cross off days on the calendar until we're playing Barcelona in Morocco. I want to see Vancouver become the first Canadian team to not choke away to Santos Laguna. I want to write a post discussing how Jun Marques Davidson can cope with Lionel Messi.

It matters because Toronto is a rival. This would have been unthinkable three years ago, but swing by the message boards or the Facebook groups today and you'll see Whitecaps fans who hate Toronto every bit as much as they hate Seattle or Portland. Beating them would be a brilliant chance to taste the tears of the Toronto-loving media who pretend to be "national" and fans genuinely convinced they invented Canadian soccer (the Toronto Lynx? Aren't they a women's team?).

It matters because the Whitecaps are just so cursed in this competition. The Montreal Impact throwing their final game in 2009, lightning in 2011, seven years where the Whitecaps might have been the best Canadian team anywhere but would still somehow get fewer points in Voyageurs Cup matches than the Impact every time. At some point the trophy matters even more when it works so hard to escape your grasp.

It matters because it's silverware, and unless you count the Disney Pro Soccer Classic (and you better not) the Whitecaps haven't won any silverware since 2008. To some fans that might not be a long time; to the Whitecaps it's a drought. Particularly when your national cup has three to four teams in it.

Some people will say that the Whitecaps need to rest some players and go for it Saturday against Portland. That will be a big game, no doubt, but those people are wrong. This game is the climax of the spring, and if the Whitecaps lose at Jeld-Wen in exchange for a win at BMO that's fine by me.

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As we know, Danny Koevermans thinks Toronto FC is the worst team in the world. He didn't just blurt that out in a moment of frustration; he defended it even after Adrian Cann called him out for it. So obviously Koevermans meant to say what he said. And he once scored a goal against Luxembourg so he knows a thing or two about awful teams.

People (including Waking the Red) have pulled out the strong eyeglasses to determine whether Toronto FC is actually the worst. But there's always an element of wink-wink nudge-nudge to it. The worst team in the world is obviously the FC Edmonton Supporters Group team that I played on a couple weeks ago which lost to the Vancouver Southsiders/Curva Collective by a couple touchdowns. Beyond that, I reckon Toronto FC would be favourites against at least half the USL PDL, the Atlanta Silverbacks, and probably most of the Conference National. So we have to redefine "worst team in the world" to mean "worst team in their league in the world, major professionals only" to even have the conversation.

And even then... you know what? I still think the Montreal Impact are worse.

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FC Edmonton's had a rough start to the year. Clarke Park still hasn't gotten the long-awaited seating upgrades, as the City of Edmonton is dallying over the building permits. Even the liquor license is taking its sweet time. The marketing is down from last season and attendances are going with it; an average gate of 1,196 through their first two regular-season home games. This isn't just down to the incomplete renovations: I'm told FC Edmonton hasn't halted ticket sales for capacity reasons.

What fans there are could use some wins. After a rough start against quality opposition and a Voyageurs Cup that consisted of moral victories and scoreboard defeats, Edmonton did manage to get things going with a 3-0 home win over Carolina (thanks for the hat trick, Shaun Saiko!) and then bagged a 2-0 win over Atlanta away. Harry Sinkgraven's troops finally had things going the right direction... then, on Saturday, they suffered a 2-0 loss in San Antonio which looked even worse than that score does.

Last year, FC Edmonton was the only Canadian professional team to make the playoffs. This year, they might not threaten Danny Koevermans and company for "worst team in the world" but they're still sixth out of eight teams and far from title contenders. What the hell is going on there?

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I'm not sure I can handle all these emotional roller-coaster games crashing down at once. Edmonton, Toronto, Seattle, Portland, all swarming at us...

Nor am I sure the Vancouver Whitecaps can handle it. The team shot its bolt hard on Wednesday, playing a distinct first eleven at every position except midfield. Every core player got at least some playing time. All they got out of that was a 1-1 draw with Toronto FC that could have been so, so much worse, and which now leaves them with heavy legs and dazed expressions as possibly the best team in the West and certainly our most mortal rival comes to town for a game that would be of critical importance for our playoff aspirations even if nobody in this town gave a damn about the Sounders.

I've made the point a few times this year that, athletically, Vancouver seems to be on a different level this year. There haven't been many signs of physical fatigue in any of our games this year, although the mental fatigue has started to creep in. That's a good sign.

The bad sign is that the team now has two straight games where their brains weren't working: at New England and at home to Toronto. Some people will include home to Edmonton and call it three straight. And Seattle is an exceptionally strong team, one coming off a loss but a shedful of wins on top of that. Also, almost needless to say, they didn't have a midweek game. Vancouver's record still looks good, and all around Seattle the Sounders fans are not underestimating us; we probably won't be lucky enough to see Seattle take Vancouver lightly.

Frankly, it would take something special for the Whitecaps to win this one. They'd really have to cut out all the bullshit they've been providing this season, keep their legs strong, and hammer the Sounders in a way they haven't hammered anyone who wasn't a one-win NASL team in the last half hour of a hopeless uphill battle.

Yeah, I'm not feeling it today. Sorry, Cascadia fans.

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Toronto FC fans are pleased with how their team played last night. Well, they have a right to be. I thought Vancouver had most of the play but it was certainly close. Toronto's mediocre team exploited a Vancouver side's weaknesses, beating them up defensively down the wings (except for that one time when they didn't) and working set pieces. Vancouver scuffed too many shots and got too lazy with the ball. Julian de Guzman, continuing a quietly resurgent MLS season, had a game strong enough to make up for Terry Dunfield (who, in his return to Vancouver, seemed way too wound up).

I don't buy into the pessimism of some Vancouver Whitecaps fans; you think coming off a 4-1 loss in New England would allow for perspective, but the "this was our worst game all year!" crowd is definitely out. There seems to be reason for more shock than anger: we damned near lost to Toronto? We literally could not have come any closer to losing to a team that's oh-oh-and-snowman in league play. But the FCs played good, fundamental underdog soccer. They fought for every ball, let energy and sound positioning make up for a lack of skill, and when they got a good chance they damned well took it. Every dog has its day.

Jun Marques Davidson and John Thorrington both had their worst games of the year, which didn't help any. Martin Bonjour got caught ballwatching on Ryan Johnson's goal; we ought to have had the advantage defending the header but Bonjour lost position. And Camilo couldn't make clean contact with the ball to save his life. A bit of sloppiness, a bit of inattention, an opponent playing its heart out, and there's your 1-1 draw. No reason to panic.

Nor am I worried about the away goal. 0-0 draws are not common in this competition: there have been only three in its history (two of which came between these teams in the draw-a-week offensive nadir of the Teitur Thordarson era). As Eric Hassli could tell us, while Toronto will doubtless be bunkering and wasting time like motherfuckers, they're not always that good at it. There's at least one goal in the match, or possibly lightning.

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The New England Revolution are not a terribly good soccer team. With nine points through their first nine games, they're well off a playoff place. One of their wins came against Portland at home; not the hardest three points to get in Major League Soccer, although their other two (away to Los Angeles and home to Colorado) were perfectly respectable. Sizable sometime-St. Germain striker Saer Sene is off to a good start in his first MLS season, but other than that the Revolution have little first-class firepower. They also suffer from playing in Gillette Stadium, maybe the lamest home-field advantage in the league.

The Vancouver Whitecaps played midweek, but used very few of the same players who'll see action today. Eric Hassli will probably start and had a good run earlier this week, Sebastien Le Toux came off the bench in Edmonton to single-handedly win the game (no big deal) and will probably start as well, and probably one defender as well. The other eight names will be fresh.

This will be a great test of the Martin Rennie Era. What we have this afternoon is a game Vancouver should pretty much win, but which is miles from a sure thing. If the Whitecaps are coming out well-prepared and gung-ho, they have almost every advantage over the mediocre Revolution. If they're mentally tired, or thinking about the next two weeks, or their concentration falls short in any perceptible way, New England is certainly good enough to make us regret it.

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News from Vancouver Whitecaps world that Jay DeMerit isn't making the trip to New England. After going for 90 minutes Wednesday against FC Edmonton it's possible that DeMerit's just tired, or that he picked up a knock. Either way, it doesn't sound like the New England Revolution will have to worry about one of our regular defenders.

The smart money says that Alain Rochat will play centre back and Jordan Harvey, who Martin Rennie has frankly inexplicable confidence in, will start at left back. However, I've never been one to be satisfied with the smart money and so I ask the question: what the heck is this team going to do with Carlyle Mitchell?

Have you forgotten about Mitchell? Couldn't blame you. His only action with the Whitecaps first team this year has come in 180 minutes of Voyageurs Cup. He arrived late last season, during the absolute worst of the Tom Soehn dog days, fresh out of obscurity in Trinidad and Tobago.

Mitchell's not a big name. Heck, before the season a few people thought he might be cut. But he has 331 career minutes as a Whitecap (all competitions) and probably 300 of them have been good. He's not large for a centre back but mobile and stronger than he looks. He's also only 24 years old, which should count for plenty on a back four which has two key players (DeMerit and Lee Young-pyo) well into their thirties and another (Rochat) getting awfully close.

Mitchell hasn't got much playing time. A lot of what he did get came in garbage time last season when, frankly, the games didn't count for much and an enthusiastic puppy would have looked impressive. But so far he's hardly put a foot wrong. He brings a good two-way sensibility, has surprisingly fair technical ability given his modest origins, and, on paper at least, ought to pair well with the tall but slower Martin Bonjour. Basically, he ought to do what Rochat does at centre back, therefore freeing the Swiss star to play his best position at left back and thus sending Harvey to play his best position at bench.

Martin Rennie's stuck with a fairly stable squad this year and has been getting results. But DeMerit's absense gives an opportunity for experiment. Sticking with the sub-par Harvey - Rochat left-side tandem won't work; we know how much Rochat hurts playing in the middle and we know how much Harvey hurts trying to play elementary soccer. Mitchell's done nothing but impress in his every opportunity. For heaven's sake, give Carlyle his chance.

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Top is the flag of Toronto. Bottom is the new Canadian national team centennial kit. A limited run of these is being produced for purchase and they will be worn at two matches: when the men host the United States in Toronto (of course) this summer and when the women play the Americans at Rio Tinto Stadium in Sandy, Utah on June 30.

Given the CSA's blatantly pro-Toronto-and-damn-the-rest agenda, that's what we call an intriguing coincidence.

No, sadly for my conspiracy-loving self, I'm pretty sure it is actually just a coincidence (thanks to Twitter troll @LowtherLars for pointing it out). The jersey is meant to evoke those worn by the first Canadian national team to play an international in Canada; a arbitrary-as-hell distinction since Canada's international soccer history is far older than the CSA and stretches well into the 19th century, while Galt FC won us an Olympic gold medal in 1904. But it's as good a point in history to draw from as any, I guess, since I think this kit looks rather sharp.

The blue won't make a lot of friends and I've already read criticism of the old-style red maple leaf over the heart, but I like it. I approve of the simplicity. Many modern jersey designs with a collar look forced; this one looks natural. While I'm sure the template is just something generic from the Umbro catalogue it at least looks like it could be be-spoke to us; it's something Canadian fans will remember in ten years for the right reasons. This one gets the Lord Bob Seal of Approval, Toronto flag colours and all.

When Yashir Pinto headed that Michael Cox cross off Carlyle Mitchell's head, then deflected the bounce into the back of the net, I cheered. I'm not going to lie to you. But in a weird way it was the worst thing that could have happened to FC Edmonton.

(Obviously, that's not actually true. Pinto's goal was both delightful and essential and if Edmonton didn't score there was really no point. But I'm in a narrative here so let's just roll with it.)

The Vancouver Whitecaps were playing with undue complacency and FC Edmonton was getting almost all the chances. After Michael Nanchoff had a goal unjustly chalked off in the second minute Vancouver continued to put men forward and play with a four-man front, but absolutely nothing came of it. Paul Hamilton put Davide Chiumiento in his pocket and kept him there, Camilo Sanvezzo was isolated, Eric Hassli was playing too withdrawn to do much. Meanwhile, Vancouver's central midfield of John Thorrington and Floyd Franks just plain lost the battle and Edmonton went hard on the attack.

Pinto's goal, the Eddies' first in the Voyageurs Cup, was absolutely no less than Edmonton deserved but it did galvanize the Whitecaps. Edmonton's players got a slight case of Hero Shot and went for everything individually. The Whitecaps tightened up. When Sebastien Le Toux came in and ended the tie at a stroke, well, that was no less than Edmonton deserved either.

Then it was garbage time. Etienne Barbara came on, kicked some ass, Le Toux scored again, Darren Mattocks of all people stroked a fine finish in after a bit of an awkward start. Edmonton gave their Paul Craigs and their Ilja Van Leerdams work while bringing off their better players and looked like they just wanted to go home.

The final score was 3-1, and I hope that doesn't obscure what was an excellent and evenly played game. Ultimately Edmonton will have no cause to complain about the result, but if you don't respect that team after this then you have something to learn about soccer.

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Obviously, that first leg didn't quite go the way FC Edmonton would have wanted.

Actually, this whole season hasn't gone the way FC Edmonton would have wanted. Well, until last Sunday, when the Eddies finally scored their first win of the season by nailing the Carolina Railhawks 3-0. St. Albert, Alberta's Shaun Saiko, the third-best player in the history of that city behind Erin McLeod and me, scored the hat trick. Uh-oh! Edmonton's back!

Sadly, the storyline is not so simple. One of Saiko's goals was from the spot and another really should have been corralled by goalkeeper Ray Burse. Edmonton and Carolina played pretty even soccer until everything Saiko touched started turning to goal and these ain't Martin Rennie's Railhawks, with Carolina expected to vie with the Atlanta Silverbacks for last in the NASL. Plus, this week Vancouver has every off-field advantage: playing at home with one more day of rest.

Then again, Martin Rennie is expected to once again run out the B team for this game (rumour is he might actually play Russell Teibert, which surely means he's not taking Edmonton seriously). Edmonton certainly look like they could have scored last week. And two goals isn't that many, as the 2009 Whitecaps could remind us.

This isn't to start predicting upsets and shouting "Vancouver 1, Edmonton 3!" from the rooftops. I have confidence the Whitecaps, who are on better form and should get some quality from their depth, will win both the match and the tie. But it's a boring preview if I just talk about why favourites are favourites so let's at least try to find a reason or an upset.

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Most hardcore Canadian fans love the Voyageurs Cup. It was, after all, a trophy created by those same fans and their predecessors to recognize out soccer champions back in the dark days of the early 2000s, when MLS seemed like a pipe dream and our sole hope was that the Edmonton Aviators wouldn't fold before the end of their first season. Its mere existence is a tribute to the power and perseverance of the Canadian soccer supporter, to say nothing of the great national championship and our only route to the CONCACAF Champions League. It is a fantastic event.

The casual fans, however, disagree.

Last week, the Montreal Impact saw their lowest attendance of the season at Olympic Stadium for their game against rivals Toronto FC. FC Edmonton drew fewer than 3,000 fans to see the Vancouver Whitecaps at Commonwealth Stadium (their largest gate so far this season but still a disappointment). You can bet money both the Whitecaps and Toronto will have low attendances for the return legs tonight.

Some of this is inevitable. Voyageurs Cup games are always on weekdays and it would take an uncharacteristic act of heroism from the clubs, the leagues, and the Canadian Soccer Association to ever change that. And you'll never get fans in an MLS city as excited to see an NASL team because MLS's entire purpose is to convince fans that they're a vastly superior league than the NASL and just ignore the evidence of your eyes because major league!!!!

But the MLS clubs themselves do an awful job of attracting interest to the Voyageurs Cup. You'd think an organization would want as many well-attended home games as possible, and yet these Cup games are treated with barely-veiled contempt while the Champions League is an afterthought. This is an amazing competition, built up from the grass roots, featuring terrific games which all Whitecaps fans should love to death, and yet it gets a fraction of the attention it deserves.

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One of the worst parts of the summer is seeing which Vancouver Whitecaps Residency players won't be part of the team going forward. For every Caleb Clarke there are ten who don't get that homegrown contract from the Whitecaps and some of them are bloody talented. No announcements have been made, but we can make some educated guesses: Daniel Stanese is in Germany, trialling for a contract. Midfielder Alex Rowley and defender Jason Van Blerk are set to attend Simon Fraser University starting this fall. Other Eighty Six Forever favourites like Tim Hickson and Callum Irving aren't listed on the team's official USL PDL roster; Irving played last week against Kitsap but Hickson was on the outside.

This is sadly inevitable. Not every player can ever sign a professional contract. Some won't be good enough, some will be bad fits, and some will just slip through the cracks. It's always unfortunate when a talented young player is told to pursue other opportunities but there's no way around it. It's worse in Major League Soccer, where only two of a team's homegrown players are eligible for Generation Adidas contracts at any given time, and everyone else has to face signing for a pittance on the MLS developmental scale.

That's the most infuriating part. Because of MLS's youth-hostile roster rules, it's difficult for a team like the Whitecaps to take risks. To get a Generation Adidas deal you better be Russell Teibert or Bryce Alderson, and even Clarke was scoring almost a goal and a half every 90 minutes in the U-18 league before he earned a regular homegrown contract. Yet plenty of prospects, particularly defenders, don't reach their full potential until their early twenties. MLS teams are filled with players who were playing an extremely marginal level with amateurish coaching as teenagers, but continued to develop into their twenties and became draft picks. Would-be homegrown players, on the other hand, must impress young.

Every time a player is cut loose too early, the Whitecaps lose a potentially useful prospect. The player may have bad feelings, however unjustified, and you can't underestimate the impact a few influential, disgruntled alumni can have in as close-knit a community as Canadian soccer. We all know how soccer clubs, steeped in tradition and habit, can sometimes lose track of the human factor: spending $50 million on a big transfer then not hiring somebody to help him settle in a new country, for example. Human resources management stinks in professional sports and it stinks even worse at the youth levels. The Whitecaps lead the country in their U-18 and younger programs, but beyond that something must be done.

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Okay, so I didn't watch the Vancouver Whitecaps dramatic unbelievable come-from-behind game-of-the-season 2-1 victory over the Western-leading San Jose Earthquakes. I'm still in Alberta. Worse, I'm in Calgary. Nothing more dreadful than missing a classic soccer game because you're stuck in freaking Calgary.

But I saw the highlights so I think I'm qualified to talk about this game. (With an attitude like that, I'll soon be qualified to host sports radio but that's neither here nor there.)

It was a rare chance this year to see Vancouver open the game up. We've seen the success Martin Rennie's had getting one goal and clinging to it for dear life: now we see what his team can do when he turns his big guns on the opposition. All the old statistical worries were absent: we had more shots, more shots on target, equal passing accuracy, and possession was so close to a wash it really doesn't matter.

Gershon Koffie's goal was ridiculous, wasn't it? His poor shooting accuracy is pretty much a running gag but if we see make headers like that then his shots can knock me out of the press box for all I care. Admittedly, you won't see many opportunities for them: that was the first time in a while I remember any Whitecap, let alone the shoot-first-ask-questions-never Camilo Sanvezzo, making a great delivery to another player from a free kick.

And Eric Hassli's winner. Well. Again, I caught the result on Twitter, I saw the goal in a highlight package, I was completely devoid of any sort of emotional context, and it's still a triumphant thing to see. Hassli's power is still somewhere in Seattle but his accuracy is making a long-awaited return: the shot was a bit of a dribbler but he couldn't have put it in a better spot. Then he runs out to celebrate, collapses to his knees in joy and relief, his teammates mob him...

...yeah. Even from a province away on a crappy netbook screen the morning after, this team is just so much fun.

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The Vancouver Whitecaps thumped FC Edmonton with what can charitably be called a B+ lineup. Yes, I said "thumped". The 2-0 result was certainly decisive enough.

It's not like Edmonton didn't have their chances. Yashir Pinto had a couple and really should have scored in the ninetieth minute. He also should arguably have drawn a penalty. Kyle Porter and Ilya Van Leerdam had decent opportunities to score. Matt Lam had some good runs. But, I mean... teamwork. That club isn't nearly playing like a team yet. Harry Sinkgraven dwelt on his players' lack of size and maturity but if his guys just ran some balls out, played with a bit more precision and kept the pressure on, they might have gotten something.

The Whitecaps must have been thanking their lucky stars. Greg Klazura at right back, pretty green, not quite used to the speed he has to make decisions, and he's hardly seeing any pressure. Rather than test his knee on some tricky athletic plays Alain Rochat could keep it simple and safe. Many of the Whitecaps veterans, particularly John Thorrington, did their job like crazy closing down the Vancouver ball carriers but ultimately they just weren't challenged enough.

If we're talking about FC Edmonton as a developing squad (and I suppose we should be, given the number of guys in their early twenties on that team) then this is a hell of a lesson. When Edmonton was willing to trade punches with Vancouver and slug it out, they were close to level; Omar Salgado was a goddamned beast who turned Paul Hamilton and Jon Joseph-Augustin into pylons but he was just playing in another universe for the first half. Other than that, Porter, Lam, and Pinto were going forward well, the midfield had the occasional look... they just couldn't play consistent enough soccer to keep it together.

So the Whitecaps will be pleased and should be. Martin Rennie's gamble on depth has paid off and the club returns to BC Place with the hammer. Eric Hassli is finally on the board, Atiba Harris got yet another cheap one. A few of the lesser-seen players did enough, although only Thorrington was properly impressive, and the regulars (except Jordan Harvey, of course) kept up their end.

The game was no tactical chess match. The Whitecaps played high-pressure but let the ball do the work while exploiting the athletic advantage where they had it. The Eddies, insufficiently sharp and stumbling over each others' feet too many times, couldn't respond. That was your game and the rest was details.

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It is no stretch to call this the biggest game in soccer history.

In one corner stand the Vancouver Whitecaps, the big bad bullies of Major League Soccer. Last year's MLS doormats, the Whitecaps have charged forward and defeated some comers to become a decent mid-table team punching a bit above its weight thanks to hot goalkeeping and a lucky free kick. Under ashen-faced supremo Martin Rennie, the Whitecaps are currently running near the top of the West and, no, I don't think anybody expects them to stay there but it's bloody impressive stuff all the same.

In the other corner, FC Edmonton, plucky home underdogs. Last year they surprised everybody by challenging for high honours through much of the season, only for their form to slip in the final third of the year and Fort Lauderdale to annihilate them in one horrifying playoff defeat. They stand last in the North American Soccer League, victims of too-high expectations and unable to get a single break in the world four games into their season. Nobody expects them to stay there either.

These two teams have never met: not competitively, not in a friendly, not in a Reserves or Residency match, nada. The Whitecaps went 2-1-1 against the Edmonton Aviators in 2004, for what that's worth, which is nothing. This Edmonton team doesn't have Ibrahim Mollaibrahimagaoglu to kick around.

We have only the teams' records in their respective leagues to judge them by, and those records suggest the Whitecaps should be the favourites. Fine; even in Edmonton nobody will disagree. But I've said all year that the Whitecaps' excellent record is bolstered by a bit of luck that's unlikely to hold forever, while FC Edmonton isn't as bad as their record suggests. I even warned yesterday not to underestimate the Eddies and still the 0-3 predictions roll in.

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I was born near the soccer hotbed of Edmonton, Alberta. Growing up I wasn't really a fan of the local game but, to the extent I was, it was for the indoor Edmonton Drillers of the old NPSL (this being the NPSL that existed from 1984 to 2001, not the NPSL that existed in 1967, and these being the indoor Drillers of the last years of the twentieth century rather than the outdoor Drillers of the first North American Soccer League or the current indoor Drillers in what's left of a western Canadian indoor league... good god, these disclaimers get complicated fast). Outdoor soccer basically didn't register for me until the Edmonton Aviators came onto the scene in 2004 and, well, you know how that story ended.

I moved to the west coast while my hometown was still soccer-free, found myself drawn into the Vancouver Whitecaps world half-against my will, and before long was waving scarves and calling perfect strangers "fat bastard" with the best of them. Then Edmonton, city where I got my soccer education and which I still call "home", got another soccer team that's in year three and going strong. And today they're playing each other.

In Europe or South America it's easy. You support the club your great-grandpappy supported or the club where you grew up that's been around since the First World War. In North America, loyalties must necessarily be more fluid. I can't go back in time to not live and die with every insane Dave Gantar whistle back in 2009, but I also can't ignore the creation of my new hometown team.

It's difficult to explain to somebody who hasn't felt the same thing. It's not "sports bigamy" in the usual sense; it's not "oh, I cheer for the Blue Jays but when they're out I cheer for the Red Sox" or anything like that. It's two separate paths through the middle of my heart, one leading to Edmonton and the other leading to Vancouver, and each as strong as the other until the dreadful moment when they collide.

I think that, over the years, many a North American has felt the same way I do today. So many clubs have formed and folded and relocated over the past twenty years that a list would grow tiresome. If you're a 32 year old Calgarian you've seen between three and five professional soccer clubs in your lifetime, depending on how you're counting, and zero today. That's not too atypical.

It's naive in the extreme to think that nightmare is over forever. Once upon a time the North American Soccer League was booming, the American Professional Soccer League had a sustainable model, the Canadian Soccer League was losing money but still promising, and I could go on. There have been many false dawns for North American soccer stability, and as good as MLS and the modern NASL look there are still some awful points of danger which could bring the whole system crashing down. At 26 years old, the current Vancouver Whitecaps are almost unfathomably ancient by the standards of Canadian or American professional soccer, but can we really bet money that they'll last 26 more?

So entire generations, inevitably, grow up with divided loyalties. They're not Eurosnobs who follow Toronto FC in the newspaper but only buy tickets for Liverpool; true fans of real soccer who are just caught in the middle. It may be a soccer phenomenon unique to the United States and Canada; one of our few cultural contributions to the world's game. I can't help but feel that it makes things poorer, and yet I admit to a certain thrill in attending a soccer game that, for once, I literally cannot lose.

It's my experience that most Vancouver Whitecaps fans watched the team, at least casually, during the second division years. They might not be able to name the starting lineup of the 2009 finalists (although many can) but they also know a thing or two about the old leagues and the quality of play.

Even those fans who hopped on later would have gotten a taste of the North American Soccer League when the Montreal Impact came to town, spent 120 minutes beating the shit out of us at Empire Field, and lost because of a well-deserved crapping on by the soccer gods (thanks, Ali Gerba). And no Vancouver fan with even a slight taste for schadenfreude will have forgotten Toronto FC dropping a CONCACAF Champions League two-legged series to the Puerto Rico Islanders a couple years ago, to say nothing of the second division Whitecaps' own better-than-.500 record against MLS opposition. Or the number of players and staff we brought in from that level who are acquitting themselves well enough that we can say "hey, that league's probably not all awful."

Naturally, with all this experience and knowledge, Whitecaps fans and press are so full of confidence for Wednesday's Voyageurs Cup match against FC Edmonton there's a risk they'll float over the North Saskatchewan.

As of when I'm typing this sentence (10:20 AM Pacific), the Southsiders "I Know the Score" prediction thread has 48 predictions, of which 46 predict a Whitecaps win, one predicts a draw (and that's a running 0-0 draw prediction the guy's been making every match for three seasons), and one predicts a loss (and that's a joke). They predict, on average, a margin of victory over two goals. And if you check its brother "I Know the Lineup" thread, you'll see that a lot of these optimists are also predicting the Whitecaps to use a weakened starting eleven.

Okay, fans are always optimists. So here's Bruce Constantineau, no rookie he, writing brightly about the Whitecaps resting two or three of its most valuable players as if it's no big deal. And Marc Weber, calling any failure of the Whitecaps to advance "a shock", says that the Whitecaps are favoured "barring a natural disaster, or perhaps divine intervention.".

The hubris is so thick you can cut it with a knife.

FC Edmonton is off to a terrible start. With one draw through four games, they're doing better than Toronto FC but not by much. They were spectacularly inconsistent last year and, with team architect Dwight Lodeweges back in the unemployment line after bad luck with Japan's JEF United, if I were Harry Sinkgraven I'd be checking my back in the locker room. But they've also had the league's toughest starting schedule and some rotten luck. They have only one home game under their belt this year and will likely take on Vancouver before the largest crowd in their history. If you've watched Edmonton play, you've seen a team that's certainly not clicking but which isn't short on skill and desperately wants the sort of crazy luck that sees, for example, a poor Lee Young-pyo free kick bounce into the net. Oh, and they got Saturday off and have been training at home for more than a week.

The Whitecaps should be favourites. But by more than two goals? "Barring a natural disaster"? If the Whitecaps think that way even for a second they're in for a good old-fashioned Edmonton stabbing.

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Here's what we know about the Columbus Crew.

1. They give it up as badly as anybody who isn't really terrible. They're very near that magic goal-and-a-half-against-per-game milestone which is the statistical mark of a poor defense. They have few defenders of a high calibre and goalkeeper and, at this stage, Will Hesmer isn't scaring anybody who isn't a Toronto FC defender late in stoppage time. Most of the Crew defenders are either blood-red rookies or have been in the league a while and we know what they are.
2. In their two wins, the Columbus Crew beat Montreal at home and Toronto away. Well good for fucking you. I've played for teams that can do that, so don't expect no Canadian treble on those grounds.
3. While the Columbus offense isn't very good they do have decent team scoring. This is actually a big point in their favour, as the Vancouver Whitecaps' vaunted bunker has so far stymied teams relying on two or three big players to get their offense. Columbus won't get many goals this year, but the goals they do get could come from seven or eight guys. Even defender Chad Marshall piles up the shots: he's like Martin Bonjour with accuracy, which gives me heart palpitations at the thought of Vancouver's shoddy corner defense. The Vancouver lineup has a few defensive weak points: it'll be interesting to see how they cope with an attack that isn't very intense but is well-spread out.
4. Michael Nanchoff requested 500 tickets for friends and family. Did you hear about that? It's only exclusive to all newspapers. But what's much more interesting is the possibility that Nanchoff will get a shot tonight: he played the Reserves match last week and was one of the few Whitecaps who looked involved. With the reserves, Nanchoff played centrally but if he comes off the bench he presumably won't be taking Gershon Koffie or Jun Marques Davidson's spot. That would give Nanchoff a chance to get involved out wide which, as you know, is something the Whitecaps have lacked this year. Hell, Matt Watson's best moments last week came because he was willing to go outside and there was just so much room out there.

This game is no gimme. The Whitecaps are embarking on a hellish stretch: they're in Ohio today, Edmonton Wednesday, Vancouver next Saturday and Wednesday, then at New England, then they hopefully tangle mid-week games with either Montreal or Toronto while oh yes getting the first two games of the Cascadia Cup rolling on the weekend... it's going to hurt. Martin Rennie will have to use his depth, and one wonders how much this will effect the team's preparation even early in the trip.

If we take Rennie at his word, which you can't always do, the team will be playing more of the depth players against Edmonton. This is too bad, as a game at an Eastern opponent ultimately means far less than the Voyageurs Cup and the Eddies are not to be underestimated. But some of the players on the field tonight will also be on the turf at Commonwealth Wednesday, and some of those players know it.

Mental fitness. Never underestimate it. The Whitecaps can't help but look forward a bit during a stretch like this, not because they disrespect the Crew but because they're walking up a hill before they climb a mountain.

This morning, the Vancouver Whitecaps gave us a pleasant surprise by signing Caleb Clarke from the Whitecaps Residency. And they followed it up with bad news: Residency head coach and technical director Richard Grootscholten is on his way out of Vancouver.

Grootscholten, 46 years old, was hired a year and a half ago as the long-term successor to former technical director Thomas Niendorf. He coached the USL PDL team to fairly good success and has the U-18 team well on its way to the playoffs, as well as assisting Craig Dalrymple with the U-16s and of course overseeing the program as a whole.

It's obvious that Grootscholten had Vancouver's respect; in the wake of his resignation we're seeing disappointment from all quarters of the soccer community. With his contract reportedly expiring this summer, Grootscholten seems to have just decided to move on, but nobody can say he hasn't done his job. This year, Grootscholten has led both Bryce Alderson and Caleb Clarke to the first team roster, and he had a hand in USL PDL regulars such as Long Tan as well.

There'll be plenty of gossip over this sudden announcement when, outwardly, Grootscholten seemed very happy in Vancouver. Given Stuart Neely's appointment earlier this year as head of player management and development, maybe there was some internal friction. On the other hand, Martin Rennie never hesitated to express his respect for Grootscholten, he's certainly glad to have Richard's players, and Neely's role (transitioning players from the Residency to either the first team or elsewhere in soccer) won't necessarily conflict with a development-first job like a technical director.

Grootscholten always conducted himself with the utmost professionalism. Although his coaching in Vancouver will be done with this week, he'll stick around to help manage the transition to his successor. He isn't going out like a bitter man with an axe to grind, and such a quality, classy coach will be missed.

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Today, the Vancouver Whitecaps announced the signing of forward Caleb Clarke from the Whitecaps Residency team as a home-grown player.

The 18-year-old Clarke, turning 19 in June, is a star with the Residency and has been piling up an overwhelming number of goals this winter. Despite missing time with a dislocated shoulder suffered in Florida with the first team, Eighty Six Forever statistics credit Clarke with 21 goals in 1,485 minutes of USSDA action, or 1.273 goals every 90. That includes two in his last two games over the weekend. It should go almost without saying that he's the leading scorer on the team by far. He also scored 3 goals and 3 assists in 1,103 minutes of USL PDL last summer and was goalless with one assist in 83 minutes on last year's Reserves team.

Clarke's a tall, lanky kid who's a pure poacher. Unlike other Residency attacking players such as Ben Fisk or Carlos Marquez, Clarke was seldom employed as anything but a target man. He didn't show much versatility on a team where almost everyone was called upon at different positions, but on the other hand Clarke's also gotten indisputable results. His speed isn't remarkable but he has good positional instincts and is seldom caught offside despite playing a high line. He takes penalties accurately for the U-18s and is a good, if simple, playmaker, leaning towards making the obvious pass when defenses are drawn towards him rather than dazzling setups. He's also got strong stamina: this weekend was far from the first time he played 180 good minutes in two days.

He's a fine young player: one who takes advantage of his physical gifts against teenagers but also has skill. Like any youngster he isn't a sure thing, but what more could he have done to earn this opportunity?

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During preseason I was concerned at the Whitecaps' lack of killer instinct while in front. Sure, they kept holding leads and getting wins, but the tactics were too passive to last. While not ignoring possibilities on the counter Vancouver was content to sit back, avoid pressure in the two front thirds, keep a disciplined shape, and dare the opponent to break them down. It's not accidental: Martin Rennie's made the point a few times. "We don't have to chase the game, we don't have to open up. The chances will come to you." You could make it a drinking game.

I despise such tactics as a rule, particularly when a team does as well by fighting and pressing as the Whitecaps do. But they seem to keep working out, as not only are the Whitecaps holding those leads but they're not looking terribly threatened while they do it. It might be a bit dull when the midfield drops back, the Whitecaps let their opponents pass around them, and wear the bad guys out on a loose but very real bunker... but the three points keep making up for it.

Tonight, once again, the Whitecaps played to that oddly successful script. Camilo Sanvezzo put the Whitecaps in front eleven minutes in and the rest was lean back and take it. Vancouver had 43.1% of the possession in the second half and wound up with only two shots on target. Yet apart from a few mad scrambles, did FC Dallas really look like they might get one? The majority of the shots went to Dallas but, even while they played so far back, the best chance after the goal went to Vancouver. It's a now-familiar routine. Not always great to watch, but better than last year. It's getting us into the playoff picture.

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Early on, FC Dallas and the Vancouver Whitecaps are very close. They have the same goal differential and only two points between them in the standings. FC Dallas has been doing more scoring but they've also been conceding more. Both teams have had the advantage of playing the Montreal Impact at home, or as I prefer to call it "three guaranteed points": they've also both lost to Sporting Kansas City. Dallas has been goddamned roadkill away from home, with two losses in two games and a -4 goal differential, but on the other hand the Whitecaps are playing two games in one week for the first time this season. Neither team is entirely healthy, with veteran midfielders Ricardo Villar and Andrew Jacobson both missing out tonight.

And that's the limit of my intelligent analysis.

Dallas has seemed to be a good-but-not-great team forever. They made the MLS Cup final in 2010 but that was an upset; they were out of the playoffs in 2008 and 2009 but by no means a bad team even then. They've got decent results so far this year but they've spent four of six games at home and haven't faced world-beating opposition. Brek Shea is on a cold streak, and when he comes out of it Dallas will presumably be dangerous, but then again he was cold at the Olympics too and maybe he's just missing having some quality little men behind him to take the pressure off (bring back Jeff Cunningham!). They can get some results against good teams, throw some games away against bad ones, and since we don't even know which of those the Whitecaps are yet how can I make a prediction? The highlight of our matchups last season was when Jonathan Leathers accidentally murdered David Ferreira in two otherwise dull games.

Even the infamous mid-week match isn't necessarily a bogeyman. It's hard to gauge where the Whitecaps are at athletically but so far, so good. They've been playing stronger soccer at the end of their games than the beginning and it's rare for a player to really look bagged this season. Even traditional athletic question marks like Davide Chiumiento have looked fit for 90 minutes. They may have something in the tank for tonight, but then again they may not.

So what the hell's going to happen? I don't know. Dallas is a quick, strong team; they should be able to pound the tired Whitecaps with speed and strength. But they're also missing some of their better players and will struggle to move the ball without Villar, potentially allowing the Whitecaps to play more compactly and conserve their energy. I have no prognostication today.

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At age twenty-three, midfielder/defender Jacob Lensky has retired twice.

Lensky got out of his contract with Feyenoord by announcing his retirement in August 2008, only to resurface five months later on trial with the USL First Division Vancouver Whitecaps. He impressed but left abruptly (pissing off Teitur Thordarson to no end), first to weigh an offer from the Seattle Sounders and then to sign with FC Utrecht back in the Netherlands. Feyenoord, who lost a top young player for no compensation, weren't happy about it but what could they do?

He played very well for Utrecht, earning a call-up from Stephen Hart to the senior Canadian men's national team in November 2009. Lensky accepted the call but left Hart and Canada in the lurch when, at the last minute, he chose to play for the Czech Republic U-21 team instead (according to rumour, he informed Hart by e-mail). Two good years passed in Utrecht, but in September of 2011 Lensky left the team, and by January of this year he had retired again.

Now Lensky is on trial with the Whitecaps again, having parleyed his retirement into a chance to find a new club as a free agent for the second time. Not exactly someone Martin Rennie should take at his word, then.

But according to his former club Lensky has had a drinking problem, which caused his departure from Utrecht. He gave an interview, in English, on how he hates playing professional soccer that has to be seen to be believed. I wrote about all this when it happened; indeed Lensky's been a minor obsession of this site for years.

Lensky turned on Canada in the most duplicitous manner, and the irony of the Whitecaps bringing him in the day after so many of us booed Teal Bunbury isn't lost on me. But Teal Bunbury is a university-educated athlete who, by all accounts, is intelligent enough. He hasn't wrestled with substance abuse problems, he hasn't bounced in and out of his profession, he hasn't given interviews where he sounded like the most miserable person in the world. Teal Bunbury is some guy who grew up in the United States and didn't care about Canada; Jacob Lensky is not well.

I don't want Lensky on my team. Even apart from the Canada thing, he just isn't reliable. He's an impossible player to cheer for, but he's also impossible to hate: his biggest money-making skill is something he's been trained for to the exclusion of all else since he could walk and is also something he's shown, repeatedly, he despises. Now he's back at it, hopefully for the right reasons (but we said that last time). His story is sad rather than infuriating.

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Martin Bonjour's own goal was a dud. Headed a long throw-in straight past Joe Cannon who, standing stock still like he never even considered the possibility, looked rather stupid. Then, not twenty seconds later, a Sebastien Le Toux goal led to what would have been a fantastic Seth Sinovic shot if it had been on the right goal, with Jimmy Nielsen acrobatically tipping Vancouver's best scoring chance over the bar.

That sort of night.

Because these are the 2012 Vancouver Whitecaps, it's easy to find bright spots. Omar Salgado's first Major League Soccer experience at left wing was positive: he made our single goal and could have made a couple we didn't get. Jimmy Nielsen made first-class saves and not always off his own fullbacks. Eric Hassli, who is building up a Mustapha Jarju-sized hate club because he has emotions instead of goals, had another good game. With beginning-of-the-season luck, Vancouver wins this one; instead they had pretty average luck and lost by two.

We're almost but not quite a quarter of the way into a season where we revamped our entire team from top to bottom. You'd think that a 2-2-2 record would be satisfying in those conditions, but a few fans are starting to get the knives out. Screw that. The Whitecaps aren't a contender but we knew that already. Building a team up almost from scratch isn't an overnight process, and right now we have a decent soccer team that looks set to become a good one. So calm down.

That game stank in a lot of ways, but it would have been one of our better home performances last season. Our first goal against was down to a botched fire drill off a badly-defended set piece; a mental mistake. Our second goal against was a are-you-kidding-me bounce off Bonjour past Cannon, and our third was because we were throwing the midfield forward trying to break through. The Whitecaps were not systemically beaten and they were not played off the pitch. They allowed three goals on two shots on target, because this is soccer and soccer is a random game. Sometimes, shit just happens.

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Sporting Kansas City has six wins, no draws, and no losses. That's a lot, and they're not a bad team, but they're not as good as their record makes them look.

Four of those six wins came at home; their two road victories were over Chivas USA (and we of all people know that beating them in Carson doesn't count for much) and D.C. United, a decent team. In six wins they have only a +8 goal differential, which is pretty extraordinary: they beat the hapless New England Revolution 3-0 at home and all five of their other victories have been by one goal.

Last year's Kansas City team was fairly good defensively: they allowed 40 goals in 34 matches or 1.18 goals against per game. They kept most of the same defense together this year, adding no key players. On that basis, it's hard to believe their current record of 0.17 goals against per game is sustainable. Their offense is doing nothing extraordinary, but eventually teams are going to score on them because that's what happens in soccer. There is no question Kansas City will not keep this up. If you come here and suggest they will, I will laugh at you.

Again, Kansas City is good. They're probably better than the Vancouver Whitecaps. But they're not going to run the table: every team has hot streaks and eventually their luck turns. It is as inevitable as the sunrise. So what are the chances Vancouver turns Kansas City on their head tonight?

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This will not be a long article. Merely a brief injunction: tonight, we boo Teal Bunbury.

You'll recall I wrote an almost identical article before our home game against Sporting Kansas City last year. I shall quote liberally:

Teal Bunbury is the Canadian-born forward for Kansas City, son of our joint all-time leading international scorer Alex Bunbury. A boy who, having made two appearances for the Canadian U-20 team, consumed our money and our time, and lied to both Canadian soccer officials and the public at large about his intentions, decided to jump ship to play for the United States national team last year.

[. . .]

This is Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, and when Bunbury turned his back on Canada he turned his back on us. He hurt our national team and he hurt soccer in this country. He gave the naysayers yet another excuse to say nay. If you're a Canadian soccer fan (and I don't necessarily mean a Canadian national team fan), he hurt the game you love by thinking of his short-term interests.

So boo Teal Bunbury. Because we're Canadian, and he's not.

That was Bunbury's first professional game in the country he betrayed, and Vancouver's boo-birds were out in force. Chants of "TRAI-TOR" were audible from the stands in a city that has a reputation for not caring much about Canada's national team. You guys got the point. I was very proud of you all, and even prouder when somebody reached that article the next morning by Googling "why does vancouver hate number 9 kansas city soccer".

The challenge is in keeping it up. Booing Bunbury the first time he raises his head in Canada looks impressive on television, but booing him the second and third time is what sends a message. It's what shows future would-be traitors that we're not just a bunch of rubes who briefly get angry then stop caring, but that we're real soccer fans who pay attention and don't forget those who spit on us.

Now, Bunbury had a very good game in Vancouver last year, although he was helped by a Greg Janicki injury. You may be tempted to say "so much for booing him then" or "that didn't work" or something similar. The idea was never to somehow make Bunbury into a worse player; that's a difficult thing for any crowd to achieve. The idea was to make it clear to Bunbury, and anybody else who was thinking of joining him, that Canada knows what he did.

Today, we need to show that we'll never forget.