St. Louis City will try to brush off a heavy road defeat when they host the Vancouver Whitecaps on Saturday.
A 4-1 loss to the Colorado Rapids on Sunday was the latest bump in the road for St. Louis (4-8-10, 22 points), which finished atop the Western Conference standings in its inaugural season in 2023 but parted ways with head coach Bradley Carnell on July 1 amid an 0-6-3 slump — two days after St. Louis fell at Vancouver 4-3.
St. Louis snapped its winless streak in its first match under interim head coach John Hackworth on July 3 at home against San Jose, but allowed the Rapids to break a 1-1 tie in the 35th minute and add a pair of late goals to push things out of reach.
“You can only control what you can control. That’s what we’re trying to keep our focus on. No longer the referees or anything like that, just trying to expend energy on the things that we can help move in a positive direction,” Hackworth said on Thursday.
That match saw Roman Burki forced out just past the half-hour mark due to back spasms, but Hackworth stated that he is “fairly positive” the 2023 MLS Goalkeeper of the Year will be available against the Whitecaps.
Meanwhile, Vancouver (9-7-5, 32 points) may not be the most consistent side in MLS, but Vanni Sartini’s team has gone four straight matches across all competitions without a loss (3-0-1). The Whitecaps saw a win slip away during a 1-1 draw at CF Montreal on July 6 but defeated Pacific FC 1-0 in the first leg of their Canadian Championship semifinal on Wednesday.
Sartini, for one, is savoring the opportunity to face Burki for the second time in two weeks.
“I hope he’s in,” the Whitecaps’ head coach said on Friday. “He’s the best goalkeeper of the league. It’s going to be a problem to play against him.”
It’s no surprise that the Whitecaps’ uptick coincided with a string of strong performances from Brian White, who has scored five times in his last three league appearances to bring his total to 10 goals for the year. Ryan Gauld, who scored the lone goal against Pacific, has 10 goals and seven assists across all competitions.
Dating back to last year, the home team has won each of the first three meetings in the all-time series.
–Field Level Media
