Vancouver's finishing far outran their chances against San Diego

Vancouver beat San Diego 4-1 at BC Place, but the chances and the ball tell a more uneven story, and one late red card changed the closing minutes.

Rayan Elloumi was booked and then sent off in the 90th minute, by which point Vancouver Whitecaps had already won the game. Vancouver finished with ten men, which changes nothing about the result but a great deal about how the rest of the match should be read. Most of what follows describes a side that had eleven players for almost the whole evening.

Vancouver took 16 shots, a little above the 14.5 they average at home, and on their own those figures would be ordinary. The quality was not ordinary. Expected goals, a rough measure of how likely a chance was to go in, put Vancouver at 2.7 against a home average of 1.26, so their chances were worth more than twice their usual amount.

The finishing came on top of that. Aleksa Cvetkovic opened the scoring in the 24th minute, and Brian White doubled the lead in the 41st. Ryan Gauld and Bruno Caicedo added to it after the hour, and taken together with the chances, the goals ran well ahead of what the chances alone would have predicted.

San Diego had the ball 57% of the time, a little under the 59.9% they average away from home. They took 20 shots, well above the 13.4 they usually manage on the road, so their story was one of volume rather than quality. Their expected goals of 2.17 sat almost exactly on their away average of 2.05, which means the chances were ordinary and there were simply more of them. Onni Valakari's goal in the 83rd minute, set up by David Vazquez, was their only return, below the 1.6 they average away.

The match as a whole produced five goals, more than the league's average of 3.4 per game. San Diego conceded more than their away average of 2.5, while Vancouver let in only one, fewer than the 1.3 they usually concede at home. Takaoka made saves for Vancouver and Sisniega made more for San Diego, so both keepers were kept busy in a game that offered them plenty to do.

Elloumi's dismissal came after the result was already decided, so it had no bearing on who won. It does matter for anyone reading the match closely, because Vancouver were a man short in the final moments, and that is the one fact the scoreline alone does not carry. Vancouver ended the evening with the better of the chances, the better of the finishing and one fewer player.

The table tells the rest of the story. Vancouver are top with 55 points from 31 games, and San Diego are 12th on 35.

Player of the matchR. Gauld1 goal8.2

B. White1 goal8.1

A. Cvetković1 goal7.9

M. Laborda1 assist7.8