Eighty Six Forever, Guess the Starting XI, Vancouver Whitecaps FC

Guess the Starting XI – Match 32 vs. St. Louis City

Welcome back, everyone.

The Vancouver Whitecaps are taking things right down to the wire in the Western Conference playoff race, as they’ll face St. Louis City SC at BC Place on Wednesday night.

The visitors have enjoyed a remarkable first season in the league, leading the West with 56 points and a +22 goal differential. That being said, somewhat like Austin last season, they’ve also been incredibly good fortuned, outperforming their xG by a remarkable margin.

The Whitecaps will also be welcoming back defender Jake Nerwinski to BC Place for the first time as a visitor. With St. Louis having already wrapped up a playoff spot, it would not be shocking if they rested some of their better players to avoid the turf in Vancouver, so that could provide the home team with a slight edge.

In terms of Vancouver, despite labouring a week ago, Ryan Gauld appears determined to play as many minutes as possible to close out the season. Otherwise, pretty much everyone is available for selection (Tuesday at BC Place, everyone in the first team, other than Hasal, who is out for the year, trained fully). The one place where I might expect changes from DC United is at wingback, where both Ryan Raposo and Sam Adekugbe will be vying for more minutes.

Ok, on to rules and standings.

  • Predictions will be ‘valid’ if posted HERE (or more accurately, whichever is the correct match thread) before the lineup is officially announced, usually about an hour before kickoff.
  • You receive 1 point for every player you correctly guess to be in the Starting XI. You receive 4 bonus points for correctly predicting all 11 starters.
  • You get 5 points for correctly guessing Win/Lose/Draw, this doubles to 10 if you also predict the right score-line along with the result.
  • All this means, if you correctly predict the Starting XI, Final Score, and Winner, you can earn 25 points!
  • At the end of each half, the contestant’s lowest two scores of that period will be deducted from the cumulative standings.

17 thoughts on “Guess the Starting XI – Match 32 vs. St. Louis City”

  2. 2-1 Whitecaps

    Takaoka
    Laborda Veselinovic Blackmon Adekugbe
    Laryea Schopf Cubas Raposo
    Gauld White

    I don’t think a clean sheet is in our midst but we could score more goals than St. Louis! I hope we’re playing for a win tonight. Raposo was looking good in training yesterday. Good enough for Vanni to put him in, I’d say! But what do I know. Is Laborda ready to be back? He’s got several stitches right now! Ugh, so much blood from that injury!

    Reply

  5. AtlantisB

    Takaoka
    Lareya, Laborda, Ranko, Blackmon, Adekugbe
    Ahmed, Cubas, Vite
    Gauld, White
    Caps win 2-1

    Reply

  6. Dzirk Pics-
    Starting XI for Match 32 vs St. Louis

    Takaoka
    Laborda Blackmon Veselinovic Raposo
    Laryea Cubas Ahmed
    Gauld Adekugbe
    White

    ‘Caps win 3-1
    go ‘Caps

    Reply

  9. Starting XI & Score Prediction

    Takaoka
    Laborda Veselinovic Brown
    Cubas
    Raposo Schopf Ahmed Adekgube
    Gauld White

    Score: ‘Caps 1 – 2 St. Louis

    Reply

  11. Takaoka
    Brown Veselinovic Blackmon
    Laryea Ahmed Piranha Vite Adekugbe
    White Gauld

    3-0 Caps against a rotated St. Louis.

    Reply

  13. Gauld White
    Ahmed Berhalter Schöpf Raposo
    Cubas
    Adekugbe Veselinovic Brown
    Takaoka

    VAN 2-1 STL

    So I’ve been wondering where Martins disappeared to and including him at LWB every now again because you keep writing that, “pretty much everyone is available,” but it turns out he’s been injured and very much unavailable for months now. Would it be possible to include all real injury statuses in these in the future? Just an idea😊

    Reply

    1. Martins has been back to full training the last week or two, technically he was listed as questionable for last match for example, but I don’t think he was a real option to play. I suppose I made the assumption that guys out of the picture longer term didn’t need their own note every time they were out, and that I would mention when they are back in the picture again. But that’s a fair point, I’ll make an effort to do that when official statuses are available. TBH, I doubt Martins sees many minutes the rest of this season with the newcomers in play.

      Reply

      1. Caps 3 0 w

        Takoaka
        Laborda, ranko, brown
        Adekugbe, berhalter, shopf, lareya
        Vite, gauld, white

      2. I don’t think anyone injured needs to be listed here, to be honest! The information is available in other places.

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