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Harjeet Johal ,

April 5, 2015 Twitter

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VANCOUVER, B.C - The Vancouver Whitecaps are alone at the top of the MLS table thanks to a 2-0 victory over the Los Angeles Galaxy on Saturday night at BC Place. 21,000 spectators witnessed goals from Kekuta Manneh and Octavio Rivero ten minutes apart in the second half. A shocking lacklustre performance from the reigning MLS Champions did them in as Carl Robinson and the Caps now lead the Supporters Shield race with 12 points and a 4-0-1 record. LA falls to 1-2-2 on the season. Carl Robinson was happy with the result against what he considers to be the best Major League Soccer team year in, and year out. Robinson also talked about a one game at a time mentality. "It’s important that we won because we won last week, and we probably didn’t play as well as we should have or could have. Not from the fault of any of the guys. They don’t go out there and try to perform badly, but that happens sometimes. Their levels aren’t what they should be, and I asked them for a response today. After 45 minutes and it was nil-nil, I was a little bit worried because we were playing well, but it’s about winning. We managed to get two goals against the best team. Say what you want, they are the best team. They prove it year in and year out. They have some of the best players. It was a good result for us, but it was one game." Kekuta Manneh was able to use his speed, touch, and shot to put the Caps ahead in the 56' minute. Octavio Rivero added his 4th MLS goal of the season in the 66' minute as he buried a rebound past a Jaime Penedo. Rivero now has sole position as MLS leading goal-scorer. The 23 year-old was delighted to score, but more importantly thrilled with the team victory and performance. "I feel like this is the best game we played. We have to keep playing the same way to move to the next game because we did very well in this one. I'm happy to score, but it's always good to have a win, to play that well." Whitecaps keeper David Ousted did not have much to do on this evening as he was credited with having to one save. The Danish keeper now leads MLS with 3 clean sheets after recording 13 last season. "The centre backs played fantastic. They cleared almost everything today. One of your esteemed colleagues told me I didn’t have much to do today and he was right. I had an easy night because we did great defensive work."



The Opening 45

The friendship between Carl Robinson and Robbie Keane was put on hold for 90' minutes. The Irish striker has always carried an upper hand against Robinson and the Whitecaps. Today Robbie Keane and Gyasi Zardes were kept in check. LA were not on the right foot from the get go. Vancouver wanted to have better ball possession and more created offensive opportunities as a result of possession. In the opening twenty minutes of the match, the Caps did a great job holding onto the ball and not giving it away. LA was expecting a quick counter-attack from the Whitecaps and early on Vancouver was content to create opportunities by keeping the ball. Nicolas Mezquida played a terrific ball to Pedro Morales and he turned to take a shot on target. Jaime Penedo made the save. The Whitecaps created offensive by maintaining ball possession and also advancing on the counter-attack. The two-pronged approach seemed to surprise LA as they had no answer. Bruce Arena's players started out of the gate slow as they were chasing the Whitecaps and unable to get the ball. The long ball tactics that the Galaxy did try, were easily headed away by Whitecaps centre-backs, Pa-Modou Kah and Kendall Waston. Russell Teibert made his return to the Whitecaps after playing an international matches with Canada in Florida, and Puerto Rico. Teibert covered a lot of ground in the opening forty-five and was buzzing all over the pitch. The Niagara Falls, Ontario native has always been a thorn in the side of Robbie Keane. Whenever the Caps and Galaxy have battled, Teibert is always within arms length. The fiery Keane was in a surprisingly good mood after the match as he spoke to the media about the result. "Listen, they played better than us. It doesn't matter about chemistry. Tonight that obviously wasn't there. It wasn't because we weren't trying, it was just the fact they were the better team, simple as that. Sometimes in certain games you just have to hold your hand up and accept it and move on." The Galaxy looked out of sorts in the first half. Vancouver's strategy of holding on to the ball and moving forward with sharp, accurate, and precise passes limited LA. The midfield of Ishizaki, Juninho, Husidic and Vayrynen were not able to connect with the Galaxy strikers. Mika Vayrynen was forced to leave the match in the 40' minute due to a right calf muscle injury. Robbie Rogers entered the match and played on the left flank. Moments later Pa-Modou Kah picked up the only yellow card of the first half for impeding Gyasi Zardes. Going into the break the match remained scoreless with Vancouver creating the majority of scoring chances. Not only are we top of the table - we also have leading goal scorer, assists (tie), and clean sheets (tie) - Kings of MLS! #vwfc — Steven Lamothe (@ssslamo) April 5, 2015

Great effort by Whitecaps. So many great performers vs LA: Morales, Rivero, Waston, Teibert, Mezquida, Laba. No passengers tonight. #VWFC — John Molinaro (@JohnMolinaro) April 5, 2015

The Second Half

The Whitecaps opened the scoring thanks to a terrific finish and a burst of speed from Kekuta Manneh. Pedro Morales played a wonderful through ball up to Manneh, and the Gambian flash broke in past the Galaxy. Tommy Meyer was turned inside out as he tried to defend Manneh. Kekuta's shot was well taken and Jaime Penedo was cleanly beat. Pedro Morales is currently tied for the league lead in assists with 3 on the season. The Caps skipper talked about how possession was an extremely important factor in the Whitecaps big win. Pedro Morales with a game-high 83 touches. Only had 59 last weekend vs. Portland. #VWFC — Farhan Devji (@farhandevji) April 5, 2015

"It was a very important game. The whole team played very well. It was a very good tactical performance. We had more possessions tonight than the last game. It’s important to win here in our house and now have a four-game winning streak. We have another important game on Wednesday." The confident Whitecaps kept coming and Los Angeles got caught ball watching as the duo of Nicolas Mezquida and Octavio Rivero doubled the Vancouver lead in the 66' minute. Mezquida's sharp angled shot was saved by Penedo, however he played the ball into the path of Rivero. The Uruguayan striker buried the ball from in close for his 4th tally in his first five MLS matches. Omar Gonzalez was honest following the match when he admitted that the LA Galaxy weren't sharp and did not come out ready to play. "I just didn't think we came out with the right energy. They obviously came out with a lot of energy, ready to play, and ready to press us in every area of the field and ready to attack when they got the ball. We just weren't good on the night." Looking to keep the pace of the match going both managers made an offensive minded substitution in the 78' minute. Darren Mattocks came in for Kekuta Manneh and Alan Gordon entered as LA's third and final substitution for Tommy Meyer. The Galaxy simply ran out of ideas and didn't really have many to start with in the opening half. Vancouver controlled the match from the opening kick off. The visitors were caught out and had no answers for the counter-attacking possession oriented Caps. Bruce Arena and the Galaxy did not look anything close to the team that won the MLS championship last season. Despite the slow start, Gyasi Zardes feels confident that his team will turn it around and eventually find the form LA showed last season. "To be honest we’re one of those teams, we have a lot of veteran players. Last year I think we even started out worse than this year. It’s a long season and we’re going to move and stride forward. I feel okay with the team coming forward." The Whitecaps finished with a 52% possession advantage and carried the play for the entire match. Los Angeles did not look comfortable and rarely threatened the Caps back-line or David Ousted. Octavio Rivero also believes the possession Vancouver had, was a key ingredient in the win and overall play. "This was one of the reasons why we had a good game. Having possession, creating chances, we are working during the week to play that away and it works because we had a good game." Man of the Match





Octavio Rivero

Once again the youngster is the MOTM and has had a huge impact since joining the Vancouver Whitecaps. He leads MLS in goals, won the Player of the Month award for March, and is an early candidate for MVP and MLS newcomer of the year. You want your strikers to lead by example, score goals, and make other players around them better. Rivero has done all of that and more just five matches into the MLS season. Not even Octavio himself could imagine that he would have such a great start in MLS. "I'm very happy about that, I never thought it would be this good at this point."

Who was your Whitecaps Man of the Match?

Vancouver Whitecaps Starting XI: David Ousted; Steven Beitashour, Kendall Waston, Pa-Modou Kah, Sam Adekugbe; Matias Laba, Russell Teibert; Nicolas Mezquida (Deybi Flores 82), Pedro Morales (C), Kekuta Manneh (Darren Mattocks 78); Octavio Rivero (Erik Hurtado 86). (4-2-3-1) LA Galaxy Starting XI: Jaime Penedo; A.J. DeLaGarza, Omar Gonzalez, Tommy Meyer (Alan Gordon 78), Todd Dunivant (Edson Buddle 64); Stefan Ishizaki, Juninho, Mika Vayrynen (Robbie Rogers 40), Baggio Husidic; Robbie Keane(C), Gyasi Zardes, (4-4-2) Notes: Russell Teibert earned his 50th start for Whitecaps FC and LA Galaxy midfielder Juninho earned his 200th competitive appearance for the LA Galaxy. Los Angeles has not won a road MLS match outside of the state of California since August 20, 2014 in Colorado.