Brian White scored a brace and Sebastian Berhalter added a goal and had two assists as the Vancouver Whitecaps cruised to a 6-0 victory over visiting Minnesota United on Sunday afternoon, spoiling the MLS debut of James Rodriguez.
Emmanuel Sabbi and Mathias Laborda each had a goal and an assist and Cheikh Sabaly also scored a goal for Vancouver, (4-0-0, 12 points), which moved into a tie for first place in the Western Conference with Los Angeles FC. Yohei Takaoka made four saves for his third shutout of the season.
Drake Callender finished with two saves for the Loons (1-2-1, 4 points).
Minnesota, playing without captain and starting center back Michael Boxall (adductor), was carved up defensively by the Whitecaps, who bolted to a 4-0 lead in the first 43 minutes.
Berhalter started the scoring in the eighth minute when he roofed a right-footed penalty kick into the middle of the net as Callender dove to his right. The score was set when Loons defender Kyle Duncan knocked down Jeevan Badwal with a tackle in the box.
White made it 2-0 in the 13th minute when he redirected a right-footed shot inside the right post off a Sabbi pass from the right end line.
Laborda followed in the 22nd minute when he deflected Berhalter’s free kick inside the near left post.
Minnesota defender Nectarios Triantis had a chance to cut the lead to two in the 38th minute but his right-footed shot from the middle of the box, the team’s first shot of the match, caromed off the left post.
Sabbi then increased the Whitecaps’ lead to 4-0 five minutes later when he took a through pass from Berhalter on the right side of the box and drove a right-footed shot into the far left side of the net.
White got his brace in the 54th minute on a penalty kick, netting a right-footed shot into the left corner to make it 5-0.
Rodriguez, the Golden Boot winner for Colombia in the 2014 FIFA World Cup in Brazil, made his long-awaited debut for the Loons in the 64th minute and set up a scoring chance five minutes later with a curling corner into the box that resulted in a Kelvin Yeboah header that Takaoka grabbed.
Sabaly then made it 6-0 in the 74th minute with a left-footed shot from the right side of the six-yard box past Callender and off Morris Duggan trying to clear it at the goal-line.
Vancouver brought in Rodriguez’s former Bayern Munich teammate, Thomas Muller, as a sub in the 77th minute, marking the first time in MLS history that two former World Cup Golden Boot winners played in a game. Muller won the award while leading Germany to a third-place finish in 2010.
–Field Level Media
