The Vancouver Whitecaps will look to continue their positive (league) form as they welcome the Portland Timbers to BC Place.

The ‘Caps are coming off a very high high and a low low. They spanked CF Montreal 5-0 and then were on the end of a spanking of their own against LAFC. The past week has been a continuation of a season full of sudden swings between good and bad football. I mean, how many teams win two out of nine but win both of those games 5-0? Exactly how good the Whitecaps are is still kind of hard to parse. They clearly are not on the level of the league’s elite but there is also clearly some distance between them and the true bottom feeders. But you can’t really get more specific than that.

It will be interesting to see how Vancouver handles this one as they are all but eliminated from the CONCACAF Champions League and several key players already played significant minutes in that game.

Things are not off to a good start for the Timbers. Their league position is bad and their underlying data is even worse. They have the second worst expected goals for in the West and the third worst expected goals against. They have also had bad goalkeeping. Strangely they have opted to bench the excellent Aljaž Ivačič in favour of the less excellent David Bingham. Ivačič took to social media to say he was fit to play and anything else that we might hear was “a lie.” Which, you have to say, is an odd thing to come out with unprompted. But Bingham picked up an injury and Ivačič played their most recent game so whatever is going on behind the scenes, it’s not bad enough for them to turn to Hunter Sulte. So the Whitecaps won’t be lucky enough to encounter the Timbers when they are further handicapping themselves. But Portland have been poor enough that the ‘Caps should still be able to overcome them if their recent turn around in (league) form is genuine.

Portland’s struggles are in part driven by numbers key players being out injured. Key players like Yimmi Chara, Pedro Bonilla, Sebastian Blanco, and Christian Paredes have barely seen the field if at all. This weekend, the Timbers will be without the services of Felipe Mora, the aforementioned Chara and Blanco, as well as Eryk Williamson.

In terms of the nuts and bolts of team form, the Timbers are coming off two straight draws: 1-1 on the road at FC Dallas this past weekend and 0-0 at home against the Galaxy the weekend prior. Before that, the Timbers were blown out 5-1 by Atlanta United back on March 18th in ATL.

Overall, after the way the Whitecaps played midweek, this is another matchup, like CF Montreal, that the home side needs to take advantage against vulnerable opposition. Will they be able to execute and will Vanni Sartini field a logical starting lineup? Only time will tell.