Saturday night at BC Place, the Vancouver Whitecaps came away with a 3-2 win following a dramatic stoppage-time reversal, as the hosts scored two in four minutes to come away with three points, securing the home-and-home sweep over their rivals from the Beaver State.

I won’t repeat too much of our Post Match summary, but it’s safe to say the Whitecaps deserved a share of the spoils, even before Thomas Müller converted from the spot following a handball foul inside the area. Though Vancouver was not perfectly clinical in the attacking third, they played well once again and were largely dominant from start to finish.

There are some interesting nuances from the individual performances, so let’s take a look:

Yohei Takaoka – 8.0

A beautiful assist on Vancouver’s opening goal, and he made two or three excellent 1v1 stops late in the first half. An impactful showing from him, even if he could have taken a nap in the second half.

Edier Ocampo – 8.0

He took his chance on the opening goal with a great run, even if there was a huge error from James Pantemis. He spent much of his time in Portland’s defensive third and was pretty active, both with the ball at his feet and with his service. A nice showing.

Tristan Blackmon – 7.0

A solid night from Blackmon, though perhaps a bit less sharp than usual with his long passes.

Mathias Laborda – 6.5

For whatever reason, Laborda seems to suffer from the odd moment of head loss when he plays centrally, as happened on Portland’s second goal right before the half. You also don’t get the same in-possession impact from him, as he’s a lot more limited playing passes centrally, and is better at running down the flanks and playing in crosses, rather than carrying or advancing the ball himself.

Tate Johnson – 7.5

Like his fullback counterpart, Tate was lively in the final third. He also had some fun battles with Kristoffer Velde and held up very well in 1v1 situations.

Jeevan Badwal – 6.5

The young Canadian has taken huge strides this season, but it’s clear that asking him to play in a double pivot is still a lot to ask, especially if his partner is not Cubas. A bit like Pedro Vite, Badwal enjoys the flexibility of a free role, and sometimes struggles to balance defensive play and covering a ton of ground with the creative side of things, which is more than fair enough in my view. We’ll see how Jesper Sørensen wants to deploy Jeevan going forward.

Sebastian Berhalter – 8.0

Berhalter was buzzing around, playing in a lot of crosses and through balls with somewhat limited success throughout the match, but that all paid off in the 95th minute, as the USMNT star had his signature moment, calling game with his distance strike.

Hard to say enough about the energy and quality this guy brings to the team. There could be some big offers coming in this summer for the pending free agent.

AZ – 6.5

As we touched on in the Post Match, having Müller and AZ on the pitch at the same time feels a bit redundant, as they both like to occupy the same spaces and do the same things. I think Jackson is a very useful player, but his utility is definitely context dependent, and it didn’t quite work in this match.

Cheikh Sabaly – 6.0

We talk a lot about stats and metrics on this website, but sometimes things just don’t pass the eye test, and I would say that Sabaly has not passed that test so far in Vancouver. He is knocked off the ball very easily, and his decision-making looks slow. Could he settle in and be a solid secondary contributor? Sure. I can’t see a lot more than that from him, though.

Thomas Müller – 6.5

His goal from the spot makes the stats look decent, but the German has been very mediocre to start the year, and I do wonder a bit exactly what this team can expect from him through the rest of the season. I don’t think the Whitecaps need Müller to be a true star, but you’d like a bit more than what you’re seeing right now.

Brian White – 6.5

A bit like Müller, it’s been a slow start from White, and there have been too many matches where he’s just failed to make any impact. White had 28 touches in this one, but it felt more like 10. I think for Vancouver to unlock all of their quality in possession and score more consistently, and less in bunches or against bad teams, they are going to need to get him more involved in the buildup.

Substitutes – 7.0

This will mostly just be the Bruno Caicedo fan club. Yes, it’s a tiny sample size, but man, was Bruno electric in his debut, bringing the pace and directness that Vancouver has often lacked to start the year. Can he keep it up? I’m sure we are all hoping he can.

Otherwise, Emmanuel Sabbi’s odd start to the year continues, as he has reverted to early 2025 form rather than his end-of-season pace, which had him looking like one of Vancouver’s better players. It feels like when Sabbi is struggling, his head is always down, and he’s not seeing the field around him or anticipating play.

Rayan Elloumi came on late, but not a lot to report there.

Okay, those were my thoughts from the big comeback win. Let me know yours in the comments, as always.