Eric Hassli Archive

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Deja vu: Whitecaps let TFC escape Vancouver with an advantage, again

By
Steven Sandor
– 05/17/2012

Joe Cannon: Point-blank save on Nick Soolsma

It is the nature of two-legged Cup ties that the first game is often forgotten. Quick. Think back to the first leg of the Chelsea-Barcelona Champions League semifinal. Doesn’t come back to you as quickly as that epic second leg, does it?

And when we think of the 2011 Voyageurs’ Cup final, we remember the second leg, not the first. The rainout and subsequent replay turned that second leg into a strangely epic affair, and Whitecaps fans still lament losing a second-half 1-0 lead because a downpour at BMO Field aborted the first attempt at playing the game.

Almost conveniently forgotten was the first leg, which the Whitecaps dominated in terms of possession and chances. But the ‘Caps squandered chance after chance and settled for a 1-1 draw, which set up TFC to take that home leg.

Fast forward to 2012: Again, the Whitecaps get a 1-1 draw at home. A 91st-minute wonder volley from Eric Hassli, which came just minutes after keeper Joe Cannon denied TFC striker Nick Soolsma a vital insurance goal on a point-blank chance, gave the draw a euphoric feel for Vancouver fans.
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Hassli’s thumping volley allows Whitecaps to draw level with TFC

By
Martin MacMahon
– 05/17/2012

Eric Hassli

It was another Eric Hassli special.

With the Vancouver Whitecaps down 1-0, the big Frenchman reached into his bag of magic tricks and pulled out one his finest efforts yet, hitting a powerful volley into the top right corner of Milos Kocic’s goal.

The wonder strike ensures it’s all squared up at one apiece going into next Wednesday’s second leg at BMO Field, after Ryan Johnson fired Toronto into the lead with a 66th minute header from a cross from Julian de Guzman.

“Alain [Rochat] gave me a great ball,” Hassli told reporters following the match. “I practiced yesterday. I killed some birds [with wayward shots] and today was pretty good – lucky too. It’s a good goal.”
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Revenge is a dish best served cold: Nguyen haunts Whitecaps

By
Martin MacMahon
– 05/13/2012

Lee Nguyen in a Whitecaps' jersey

The streak is over, and it’s largely due to a castoff.

After winning five consecutive matches in all competitions, the Vancouver Whitecaps fell to the New England Revolution 4-1 on Saturday, mainly thanks to Lee Nguyen, the twice-capped U.S. international attacking player the club waived following preseason.

Nguyen scored twice and set one up on the night at Gillette Stadium, creating his own version of the cliched tale of a player proving his old coach wrong.

But while the final score heavily favoured the Revs, things didn’t appear scripted for that conclusion in the early moments, as the ‘Caps took a fifth-minute lead through Eric Hassli.
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Le Toux, Whitecaps, beat down FC Edmonton’s brave resistance

By
Steven Sandor
– 05/10/2012

Vancouver's Floyd Franks, left, takes on FCE's Shaun Saiko, right.

For 75 minutes of Wednesday’s second leg of the club’s Amway Canadian Championship final against the Vancouver Whitecaps, things looked good for FC Edmonton to be Cinderella at the BC Place ball.

The Eddies had a 1-0 leading, halving the 2-0 deficit from the first leg at Commonwealth Stadium. The soccer gods looked to be smiling on them, as an early goal from Whitecap Michael Nanchoff was incorrectly ruled out for offside — as replays showed that the low cross from John Thorrington was played when Vancouver’s attackers were all in onside positions. And, the Eddies had created the bulk of the chances, getting the first-ever North American professional goal from Chilean Yashir Pinto, and forcing Caps keeper Brad Knighton to make a few excellent saves, including a point-blank chance from Michael Cox.

But, with the Eddies needing just one goal to improbably send the tie crashing towards extra time, FC Edmonton crashed itself.

It all came undone in the 75th minute, when substitute Sebastian Le Toux turned left back Fabian Vorbe inside out then stroked a low shot towards the middle of the goal that went right under keeper David Monsalve.

It was a deflating moment that sent a Div.-2 side crashing down — and the Whitecaps scored twice more against the shellshocked Eddies to take the game, 3-1, and the series, 5-1.
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Win over Earthquakes shows off the Whitecaps’ depth

By
Martin MacMahon
– 05/06/2012

Eric Hassli

Big Eric is back.

He left it late, but Eric Hassli’s 94th minute stoppage-time winner gave the Vancouver Whitecaps a 2-1 win over the San Jose Earthquakes Saturday night at BC Place, sending the 19,271 fans home happy.

First-half goals from Chris Wondolowski and Gershon Koffie appeared to set the match up for a draw before the substitute had other ideas, getting on the end of a pass from Davide Chiumiento before beating goalkeeper Jon Busch with a low shot into the right corner.

The goal breaks the Frenchman’s 17-game Major League Soccer goalless streak, and gives the previously hapless striker two goals in two games in all competitions following his match-winner against FC Edmonton in the Canadian Championship semifinal, first leg on Wednesday.

“It’s like almost six months I didn’t score [in MLS],” Hassli told The 11 following the match. “So, I’m happy tonight, but the most important [thing] is that we won 2-1 and we continue our way.”
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Blame FCE’s losses, not City of Edmonton, for poor attendance at Commonwealth Stadium

By
Steven Sandor
– 05/03/2012

Commonwealth Stadium before the ACC match: Most of the seats remained empty

The number was painful to read, painful to report. In a concrete monolith of a stadium that’s built to seat more than 60,000, just 2,777 people came to see FC Edmonton play the Vancouver Whitecaps in the first leg of their Amway Canadian Championship semifinal.

And that number was bolstered by a healthy number of Vancouver supporters who made the trip to back the Whitecaps. In fact, from the broadcast booth on the other side of the stadium, the noise made by Curva Collective and the Southsiders drowned out anything the rest of the small FCE-suporting portion of the crowd could muster.

It was supposed to be a great scenario for the tournament in Edmonton. Unlike last year, when Edmonton faced Toronto, the Eddies would play a regional rival, with a chance to build something of a Western Canadian derby. The start time was at a more fan-friendly 8 p.m., when last year it was tacked onto the end of the work day to accommodate Eastern time zone TV watchers.

Yet the Whitecaps game drew far less than the 2011 edition against Toronto.
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FCE learns some tough lessons from the Whitecaps

By
Steven Sandor
– 05/03/2012

FCE's Paul Hamilton, right, heads the ball away from Whitecap Omar Salgado

In the Commonwealth Stadium press box before the game, FC Edmonton Director of Soccer Joe Petrone made the prediction: If FCE could keep the Whitecaps off the scoresheet through the first 20 minutes, if the Eddies could make it through those initial nervous moments, “we’ll be fine.”

They didn’t make it through the first 20 minutes. They didn’t settle for most of the first half, allowing a physically dominant and mature Vancouver Whitecaps side to come out with a comfortable 2-0 win in their road leg of the Amway Canadian Championship semifinal, in front of a disappointing crowd of 2,777.

“When you see the game, you see the difference in the way we play,” said FCE coach Harry Sinkgraven after the match. “They are more mature, you can see that. In battles, they are stronger. We lost too many individual battles.”
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FCE focused on not allowing Whitecaps to get an away goal

By
Steven Sandor
– 05/01/2012

Paul Hamilton takes a shot on FCE keeper David Monsalve during Tuesday's training session at Commonwealth Stadium,

Keep it clean.

That’s the prevailing message from FC Edmonton’s final training session before Wednesday’s Amway Canadian Championship semifinal first leg against the Vancouver Whitecaps.

The Whitecaps are bringing pretty much a full-strength lineup to Edmonton outside of midfielder Camilo and defender Jay DeMerit — who were both omitted from the Whitecaps’ team sheet for the game. FC Edmonton coach Harry Sinkgraven conceded that the MLS side is bigger and stronger than FCE, whose mobile-but-small backline struggled in its last NASL match against Minnesota’s six-foot-plus strikers. So, for Edmonton, the key will be to focus on the likes of Eric Hassli, Sebastien Le Toux and Omar Salgado — depending on who Vancouver chooses to start — and keeping them off the scoresheet.

FC Edmonton coach Harry Sinkgraven said that he told his squad of his exploits in European Cup matches.

“Twice in first game, we won 1-0. If you keep a clean sheet in the home game, and just score one goal away from home, then the opposition has to make three goals,” Sinkgraven said Tuesday.
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Undefeated Sporting KC extends Whitecaps winless streak to four

By
Martin MacMahon
– 04/19/2012

Aurelien Collin

After starting unbeaten in four, the Vancouver Whitecaps are now winless in just as many after a 3-1 loss to Sporting KC at BC Place Wednesday evening.

The team’s second loss on the hop started with a fortuitous goal from Aurelien Collin, got worse with an own goal from Martin Bonjour, before Kei Kamara sealed the victory with a coolly taken third.

Substitute Omar Salgado set Sebastien Le Toux up for a consolation goal in the 80th minute, but there was to be no encore performance of last season’s dramatic 3-3 draw between these clubs, which took place across town at Empire Field.

“[Sporting] put on a textbook road performance where they defended well and scored on set plays and on the counterattack, so from an away perspective those are the things you want to do,” Whitecaps head coach Martin Rennie told reporters following the match. Read the rest of this entry »

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After loss in San Jose, Whitecaps continue to be a difficult team to read

By
Steven Sandor
– 04/08/2012

Chris Wondolowski

All season long, the Vancouver Whitecaps performances can be described as “glass half-full, half-empty.”

Yes, the Whitecaps didn’t surrender a goal and were undefeated through their first four games. But their offence has been stagnant — and the team has played what has to be considered the easiest schedule in MLS out of any of the 19 clubs. And points dropped to Eastern clubs like D.C. United and Philadelphia could come back to haunt the Caps at the end of the season.

Just like the rest of the season, Saturday’s match could be talked about in that “glass half-full, half-empty vein.” The Whitecaps, kept the San Jose Earthquakes scoreline at zero for 68 minutes, and set a new MLS record for longest shutout streak from the beginning of a season at 428 minutes. Then the Caps imploded, giving up three second-half goals to the Quakes thanks to a series of mistakes in the back that’d have you thinking you were watching the 2011 edition of the team.

The Earthquakes beat the Whitecaps 3-1, and Vancouver is now 2-1-2 (or 2-2-1 if you prefer the European way of doing the tables),

But, like the previous wins and ties, this doesn’t offer much of a clue to what kind of team coach Martin Rennie has assembled in Vancouver. Read the rest of this entry »

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