Football Season Review

A campaign of big changes ended with Vancouver Whitecaps enduring their worst season since the inaugural campaign as they finished bottom of the Western Conference standings, well short of their expectation of challenging for a playoffs spot. There were wholesale changes for Vancouver both in the roster and on the sidelines with Marc Dos Santos taking over from Carl Robinson. Things did not go according to plan right from the start with Vancouver needing to wait until April to register their first win of the season and, while they did show glimpses of their potential, their inability to turn decent performances into victories meant they were out of playoffs contention by the mid-point of the campaign. Vancouver did improve slightly defensively compared to last season but ended the campaign with a joint second worst defensive record in the Western Conference while lack of goals up front, managing just 37 goals, meant that it was a difficult first season in charge for Dos Santos. Dos Santos had to underline the need for quality reinforcements time and again and, though Vancouver did end the season on a positive note, picking up seven points from their final four games, their roster will require another major surgery during the off-season if they are come up with a more sustained challenge for the playoffs spots.

Player of the Season: Ali Adnan Kadhim