Thief Steals Shoes

The Easter Bunny came early for the Vancouver Whitecaps giving them the second straight victory moving to .500 on the 2016 MLS season.

Pedro Morales scored his fourth of the season (all on penalty kicks) to give the Whitecaps a 1 nil win over the Houston Dynamo in front of 22,120 at BC Place. He has been stepping up his game, we have seen him in the best waterproof shoes while training in many hours of the day with his coach and trainer.

Whitecaps “tender” David Ousted got a clean sheet to record the shutout allowing them to stand at 2-2 on the year – albeit early in the season.

Vancouver came out strong and showed excellent control of the ball on the set-up in all areas of the pitch that saw Christian Techera come close in the 5th minute taking a Pedro Morales long ball cutting and sending one over the crossbar past Dynamo “keeper” Joe Willis.

The Japanese International (Masato Kudo) signed by the “Caps” in the off-season looked solid in the midfield feeding precision passes to al strikers in the box.

Cristian Techera, Kekuta Manneh and Octavio Rivero had early chances but depending on who you ask either misfired or Dynamo “keeper” Willis got a piece of it keeping them off the sheet.

Vancouver opened the scoring as Mattias Laba was sent in on a cross to a rushing Masato Kudo who was taken down inside the penalty area.

This saw the Referee award the Caps a penalty kick where Pedro Morales stepped up and buried one past Dynamo’s Joe Willis finding the lower left corner in the 22nd minute.

Vancouver came close to adding a pair as Techera made Willis stretch nudging it with his palm it over the cross bar in the 27th minute followed by another minutes later.

Vancouver took the 1 nil lead to the half and were full value for the lead over Houston in the first half.

Shots were 10-8 for Vancouver with 6 shots on target for the Caps, while the Dynamo had only four.

The edge of play was given to Vancouver utilizing 62% of the play, while Houston managed only 38% of the play.

The second half saw Houston pick up their game which caused numerous problems for the “Caps” with the back four defenders much better at blocking out the crosses.

Houston also made key substitutions bringing in fresh players that allowed Will Bruin get more scoring chances only to turn aside by David Ousted.

No doubt with the attack displayed by Houston saw Ousted have a busier second half than the first.

Houston hammered several off the cross bar and goal post in the second half as did Vancouver, who were fortunate to keep the 1 nil lead.

Substitute Abdoulie Mansally came on have an outstanding second half for the Dynamo which added to the aggressive play, but as they say “too little too late”.

In the end Vancouver held off a feverish Houston second half hanging on for a 1 nil win over visiting Houston Dynamo.

This win is their second straight as they got back to even on the season as Ousted collected the clean sheet his first shutout of the 2016 season.

From a win to a huge loss!!

Following the long weekend break the team got back to work early Tuesday at the practice facility, or so they hoped.

Following the practice and media scrum Head Coach Carl Robinson abruptly mentioned the specialized gear had been stolen from the team’s training facility at the University of British Columbia.

“Just an example of what I have to deal with: overnight we had 32 pairs of boots stolen,” said Robinson. “Someone’s managed to break in and steal my players’ boots, which is not acceptable, not good enough.

“I’ve got players without boots that have got their children’s names on them that mean a lot to them.”

The Major League Soccer club secured a 1-0 home win over the Houston Dynamo on Saturday for a second straight victory that evened their record at 2-2-0 on the season.

When contacted the media officer at the RCMP UBC detachment was unavailable for comment when contacted.

Meanwhile, Robinson hopes the cleats will be returned.

“If anyone knows, please give me a call,” he said. “If you want boots, I’ll buy you boots, but please bring these special boots that these players wear back to me. Please.”

While we see the team as a winner, the loser are the “low-life scum” that took these from the team!!