VANCOUVER – When Carl Robinson took on the Vancouver Whitecaps manager’s job ahead of the 2014 MLS season, he went out of his way to emphasize that youth would play an important role in his tenure.

So naturally, going into his second campaign at the helm, the Welsh tactician is keen to continue developing a core of young players he can groom into playing his favoured possession-first game.

The MLS SuperDraft takes place on Thursday, and as Whitecaps fans will be keenly aware, when it comes to selecting players from the college ranks, there’s never much certainty in terms of what you’re going to get.

On the one hand, you have players such as Erik Hurtado and Kekuta Manneh, both selected by the Whitecaps in the first round of the 2013 draft, who have both become serviceable attacking players. Darren Mattocks (a first-rounder in 2012) falls into this category as well, although his initial performances and his subsequent inability to replicate them have dampened fans’ enthusiasm for the player.

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Then on the other extreme, you have Omar Salgado, selected first overall in the 2011 SuperDraft. The club parted ways with the forward this off-season after he failed to play many meaningful minutes in his four years in the city.

This year will be a little different for the Whitecaps, who have always had at least one pick in the top four—Salgado first overall in 2011, Mattocks second overall in 2012, Manneh fourth overall in 2013 and Christian Dean third overall in 2014.

This year the Whitecaps don’t pick until No. 13.

“It will be different now picking at No. 13 if we decide not to trade up,” Robinson told Sportsnet by phone from the MLS combine in Lauderhill, Florida. “It will be nice maybe to take a step back and (let the other teams) fight it out, and we’ll pick a very, very good player with our pick.”

In any draft, there are two dominant philosophies: pick the best player, or the player that best suits your needs. In this case, Robinson says the player’s position will factor into the decision.

“We need to probably get a position-specific player,” Robinson admitted. “If the best player in the draft is a No. 10, and we have Pedro Morales, Nicolás Mezquida, Marcos Bustos in that area, is it sensible for me to pick the best player available? Probably not, because I don’t want to create a ceiling for any of my young players, especially young Canadian players.

“So I’ll probably pass at the best player that’s left, and I would look for the next position where I need to fill a hole.”

Among MLS observers, there is always a bit of a debate about how meaningful the SuperDraft is. Many of the players have come through an NCAA system, which many agree doesn’t ideally prepare players for the professional ranks given the limited practice time and relative lack of games.

Add in the fact the Whitecaps already have a developmental residency program for young Canadians and the event becomes even less of a spectacle. But Robinson feels the draft can still be an important place for the club to find good squad players, at the very least.

“I still take the draft very seriously because if I can pick up one or two players that can help me in the future—a good, solid MLS players, which is always important which you’ve seen over the last few years with numerous teams—then you have to take it seriously,” Robinson said. “So it’s still very, very valuable.”

Fresh after seeing players try to impress clubs at the combine, Robinson admitted the reality, that MLS teams can’t put too much emphasis on an individual’s performance over such a short period. Instead, they rely primarily on long-term scouting and the performances of players over the past season and their full college career.

“It’s not solely based on the combine,” Robinson said. “It’s important you use a bit of information from both. But what I look for in the combine is the fundamentals in the player’s position. If I’m looking at a midfield player, does he look over his shoulder before he receives the ball? What are his angles like? Can he react if he doesn’t have the ball?

“Those are little fundamentals you’ve got to look at, and if you can do that, then a bad performance or something like that, with a good review from the season, (the combine showing) goes out the window.”

Martin MacMahon is a Vancouver-based writer. Follow him on Twitter