BEHIND THE PLAY #67

Thomas Muller is both the most unexpected and most important player the Whitecaps have ever signed.

Hopefully, if you read this newsletter regularly you will see that I rigorously avoid hyperbole but when I wrote the above lede, even though it seems a bit extreme it didn’t strike me as over the top.

People who have followed professional soccer in Vancouver for a long time will reference Ruud Kroll, the Dutch defender/midfielder (keep in mind it was the Total Football era in Holland at this time) from the 1974 and 1978 World Cup teams that played in two finals back to back (losing both). He’s really the only one that comes close but keep in mind, one, Kroll only played 14 games for the Caps. Alphonso Davies? He’s far more famous now than he was as a Whitecap and like Bob Lenarduzzi, Carl Valentine and Dominic Mobilio falls more into the category of local legend.

But to Muller. A World Cup winner in 2014 (I was in the crowd when he scored a hat trick against Portugal in their opening game in Salvador), a two time Champions League winner and a bazillion time Bundesliga champ. There’s a really good article on his career here but I’d like to focus on what his signing means to the Whitecaps as an organization and to a team that has defied expectations this season and is still looking like a contender to be the MLS champion this season.

Signing Muller, who it seems contacted the Whitecaps about coming here rather than the other way around, pushes the Caps into the rare category of being an MLS club capable of a true marquee signing. The Zlatans, Beckhams, Henrys and Messis have historically gone to New York, LA or Miami. Big players drawn to big city lights. Not only did Muller choose Vancouver, he signed a non-DP (Designated Player) contract that puts him on around $600k a season. It’s estimated that nine players on the team currently make more than that. Now that’s set to increase monsterously next season when they can make him a DP and he’s supposedly set to earn $6m but he still chose to come here knowing the financial restrictions facing the team this season. For additional reference, he made just over 20 million Euros with Bayern last season.

I was at his first game. There’s never been anything like it here in our football world in terms of excitement aside from when Messi stiffed us last season and then when he came here this season. But this was for one our our players. The number of supporters who came to that game in some form of Muller jersey or t-shirt was extraordinary. The team sold more Muller jerseys that one day than they have for any player ever in a day and it wasn’t close. One to two thousand showed up three hours before kickoff to see him arrive at the stadium.

His personality immediately endeared him to supporters here. He is calm, well-spoken, modest and quick with a smile and a joke. He made it clear though he is here to win. Eveything you wanted to hear from him he said.

And then he stepped on the field.

Muller came on in the 61st minute. Those in the stadium could see he was coming on a few minutes beforehand. More importantly, the players could also see. His teammates had been poor in the first half despite scoring an early goal but they seemed to be aware he was soon to enter the game and it very quickly became a ‘look sharp, the boss is coming.’ type moment. The pace and effort had already stepped up in those minutes before he came on and it continued once he entered the game.

We had good seats to see the effect he had. Four rows up, right around the penalty spot at the end the Caps were attacking. Muller clearly had a free role playing in behind Brian White. He was already barking instructions and directing traffic from the moment he came on. Two minutes later, he received a pass across his body and hit an Exocet of a shot into the goal. Place went mad but it was called back for a marginal offside call in the build up. Muller showed no disappointment or frustration. He was right back to barking orders, moving horizontally across the field as much as he did vertically up and down it. HIs impact was both obvious and subtle.

If the goal had counted he would almost certainly have been man of the match even though he only played the last half hour.

Thirty minutes is a minute sample size to judge how Muller will do in this team. He did score a late, late winner for them on a penalty in his next game against St Louis but now has a very strange three week gap until their next game on September 13 against league leaders Philadelphia. That will be a statement game for both the team and for him. Keep in mind the MLS final is played at the home of the finalist that finishes highest in league play (same for conference semi-final and finals). Every point is important at this stage.

With Cubas behind him and Berhalter continuing as a box to box force, it will allow Muller to play to his strengths of creating and utilizing spaces with the freedom to play on the left, centre and right as he sees fit. Whatever allows him to get on the ball in the attacking third is what the Caps tactics should revolve around. He has fast, technical wide players in Jayden Nelson and Ali Ahmed, that he can service and who will keep defenders honest in terms of not allowing them to pinch in to limit the space Muller likes to operate in. He has in-form White in front of him as well. The ingredients are all there.

If and when Ryan Gauld returns from his knee injury, I could see a double pivot of Cubas and Berhalter with Muller, Gauld and Nelson in front of them and White up front.

If the Caps can resolve their recently crumbling centre-back situation they are definitely, for the first time in their MLS era, a contender to be champions.

Next issue: The first Behind the Play survey. It should be in BTP #68.