A hat trick of Ryan Gauld assists powered the Whitecaps to a big 3-1 win Wednesday night over Minnesota United, giving them a key leg up on a Western Conference rival.

Minnesota generated enough chances to win the match but ultimately couldn’t take them. The Caps, meanwhile, were hyper-efficient, tallying their three goals on seven shots and punishing the home side’s wastefulness in the process.

Vanni Sartini largely stuck with the lineup that grabbed three points on Saturday night, with a slight tweak in the back, swapping in Ranko Veselinovic for Javain Brown. Alessandro Schopf also returned to the starting lineup after a one-match ban.

The Caps wasted no time pouncing on a mistake from Minnesota to grab an early 1-0 lead. An absolute hospital ball from Michael Boxall never made it to Alec Smir and Ryan Gauld latched onto it, squaring up Brian White who was able to tap into an empty net.

The early lead allowed the Caps the chance to sit back and pick their spots and Vancouver actually was able to hold possession and make some nice forays forward. 

It was some magic from Gauld that allowed the Caps to double their lead. A second bite at a corner kick saw the Scot whip in a splendid cross, with multiple players lined up unmarked in the box. The ball met the head of Mathias Laborda, whose header beat Smir with ease.

Vancouver was fortunate moments later, when a massive error from Yohei Takaoka went unpunished. Taka rather carelessly tried to beat Sang-Bin Jeong off the dribble well outside his box, was dispossessed and found himself well out of goal. Minnesota took one too many passes, however, giving Veselinovic a chance to get in possession to clear the shot off the line. 

That brief burst of momentum saw the home side awarded a penalty after a rather speculative cross was deemed to have hit Bjorn Utvik as he moved to clear it, seemingly giving the Loons a lifeline. But while Joseph Rosales was looking for his first goal of the year, Takaoka stepped up to redeem himself from his earlier error to stop the spot kick.

It wound up making no difference, as the Caps switched off on the resulting corner, allowing Hasani Dotson to flick the cross to the back post, where Bongokuhle Hlongwane was lightly marked to finally pull one back for Minnesota.

The chaotic first half ended without any more goals but Minnesota definitely found their way back into things, making midfield adjustments that neutralized the Caps’ counter attacks and let them win more of the duels in the middle third of the park. The Caps were also sloppier in their build out.

The Caps started the second half a bit flat as well and Vancouver was lucky some soft defending against Jeong on the doorstep didn’t bite them, with his shot trickling inches wide of the upright. 

Vancouver basically opted to cede possession and really struggled to win the ball back for any meaningful amount of time. Erik Ramsey’s side deserves credit for some high energy pressing, basically absent in the first half, to make life uncomfortable for Vancouver’s defense.

Against the run of play, however, a rare bit of possession and ball winning led to Sebastian Berhalter scoring a worldie, banging one in off the bar from well outside the box. Possibly the young keeper Smir could have done better but some excellent passing laid the groundwork for Berhalter’s wonder strike.

Minnesota didn’t take their foot off the gas, even as the Caps made a trio of defensive substitutions — but they left a number of good chances on the table.

Takaoka was called upon to shut down Hlongwane from short range with an excellent save. Two other shots from close range were blazed over the bar. Over the last five games, basically everything that can go wrong for Minnesota hasn’t gone their way. That trend certainly continued in this one.

Stray Thoughts 

• The Caps have subsided largely off quality over quantity this season and this match epitomized that. Hlongwane alone had almost as many shots (four) as the entire Vancouver team (five). And Minnesota will rue that they didn’t take their chances in this one, as they certainly were there. It’s been awhile since they’ve been punished for it but we shouldn’t forget that the Caps’ set piece defending remains questionable and switching off after dodging two big bullets is unacceptable. The Caps were woeful early in the second half as well and relied on Berhalter’s wonder strike to take the wind out of Minnesota’s sails.
• But yet you have to feel like Vancouver still did enough to merit some sort of result (even if a 3-1 scoreline flattered them). They overwhelmed the Loons in the first 15 minutes and forced Minnesota to make some major adjustments in midfield to try and clean up the considerable space that Vancouver found. And you ultimately need to take your chances, particularly on the road, and the Caps certainly did that here
• That was a Charmin soft penalty for Minnesota in the first half but I get how VAR can’t overturn something that was pretty unclear. But if Bjorn Utvik was sent off for a handball denying an obvious goal scoring opportunity, I don’t know how Michael Boxall wasn’t also dismissed for literally slapping the ball while being the last man. MLS gonna MLS, I guess.
• I almost included Yohei Takaoka in the three stars of the match below and you could make a strong argument he should. While his adventure in the first half should have been punished with a Minnesota goal, his denial of the PK and a couple of important saves in the first half, however, more than make up for it.
• The midfield continues to struggle without Andres Cubas in terms of defense and press resistance but this was a bit better tonight. Sebastian Berhalter was solid (see below) and should remain in the lineup when Cubas returns. Alessandro Schopf? Well, I’m not so sure about that.
• The Caps needed to punish a down and out Minnesota team and they did — and it sees them up to fourth in the Western Conference. You won’t see too many complaints here, even if it wasn’t the prettiest.

Three Stars

3. Sebastian Berhalter

You could argue Berhalter deserves to be included on this list merely because of his magnificent strike to seal the game. But he also chipped in some nice progressive passes (and two key passes) and was especially impressive with some of his long balls. Defensively, he wasn’t Cubas but he was solid enough.

2. Mathias Laborda

One area where the Caps have been strangely not clinical as of late are set pieces. Laborda changed that in a big way with a great header off of Gauld’s service to notch the Caps’ second. But on a night where both of his centerback mates had a couple of errors , I thought this was a clean performance from Laborda. His eight clearances/interceptions would seem to support that conclusion.

1. Ryan Gauld

His third assist on Sebastian Berhalter’s goal was possibly a bit lucky but its hard to say anything else that Gauld did on Wednesday was fortunate. Certainly not his first two assists, where he smartly laid one off for Brian White and whipped in a brilliant ball for Mathias Laborda. It was a performance worthy of an all star and he consistently found space and made dangerous runs through the gaps in Minnesota’s patchwork backline.