The Vancouver Whitecaps look to keep rolling on the road when they visit New York City FC on Saturday.
The Whitecaps (10-8-7, 37 points) head to New York for their third of seven straight on the road. They won the first two, most recently a 1-0 victory against the Chicago Fire on Wednesday to improve their road record to 3-5-3.
“Huge,” coach Vanni Sartini said of finding success as the visitor. “We know that we go there, we can make the third win. … We had that long drought away. Now we’ve won four of the last five across in every competition, so we have the confidence to do a good job.”
Brian White has factored into that, with goals in each of his past four regular-season road matches. It ties the longest such streak in Whitecaps history, with the feat also realized in 2016 (Pedro Morales) and 2013 (Camilo Sanvezzo). A goal against New York would make White the first player to tally in five straight MLS road matches since Josef Martinez in 2019 with Atlanta United.
Vancouver enters the match in fifth place in the Western Conference, three points back of Los Angeles FC (second) and the Seattle Sounders (third).
New York (6-10-11, 29 points) will be looking to keep pushing toward a playoff spot after its most recent outing Wednesday, a 2-0 win against CF Montreal to snap a five-game winless streak. That moved NYCFC to within three points of the cutoff line, with three other sides between them and ninth-place Chicago, which holds the final spot.
It marked just the third win for New York in its past 22 matches dating back to late April, going 3-11-8 during that stretch. They’ve won two of their past three at home after going winless (0-3-3) in their previous six.
Aware of the challenge that Vancouver presents, NYCFC knows what they need to do to be successful against the Canadian side.
“They’re going to be a dangerous team so we have to be as good as we were in the first half against Montreal,” coach Nick Cushing said. “We have to control the game as well as we did. For us, the aim is to create chances, play attacking football, score an early goal, and get ahead in the game. If we can do that, we give ourselves the best chance of winning.”
Midfielder Andres Jasson scored the opening goal against Montreal, his second tally in his past three MLS matches after going his first 47 career regular-season matches without finding the back of the net.
–Field Level Media
