Welcome Matt! (oops) A bit better than Commonwealth Stadium I think ;;)

Did not watch the whole game. Disappointing draw with a team that offered little threat going forward. Rennie has to stop riding Le Toux. He's not particularly in form and he's played too many minutes already. Nanchoff and Hassli should have both come in at 65'. No need to blow this draw out of proportion but it's up to Rennie to make sure heads are up for this tough road trip. He's also got to start subbing a bit else we are going to see some breakdowns soon. The commentators cursed Thorrigton by mentioning his relatively long injury-free run tonight.

I really didn't like the Harvey for Chiumiento sub. Replacing a good possession player with... well, with Jordan Harvey when you're trying to defend a lead, is not a solid plan to me.

MATCH HIGHLIGHTS: VAN vs NY

GOAL: Bonjour smashes VAN into the lead

Many of the offsides were really bad calls on the replay.

Ahhh, not the best of efforts. Camilo really struggled, we joked a couple times he was making us long for Jarju. And it wasn't just the finishing, his touch and his passing weren't great, either. I actually felt bad for him, you know he can do it, and he seemed a bit overwhelmed by the pressure to perform.

But I didn't think anybody in the front six really stood out, although Davide had good moments. DeMerit struggled, too, not so much defensively, but his possession tonight was just horrid. Not two minutes before Bonjour scored we were talking about how he'd been our best player on the night, then he capped it off, although somebody got over him for the equalizer (I think he might have been held down). Thought Rochat was next best.

A couple of the offside calls did seem dodgy, the East side AR was calling it absurdly tight, New York had one early in the second half he called back that looked good, too.

Was puzzled by comments from Tyler Green in the post-match that Hassli wasn't hustling to pressure the backs. I thought he was pretty good from that standpoint - its how he picked up the yellow, which understandably left him a bit tentative. He did jog around a couple times, but you can't just run around like a headless chicken up there, I thought he was usually in the right spot. And his touch was okay, not spectacular, but okay.

On the whole of it, a draw was a reasonably fair result, we may have edged the play a bit, but I didn't feel like we dominated at all.

With Henry out of the line-up, you knew that they would be looking for Cooper. Demerit and Bonjour kept him quiet as he only seemed to have 2 shots (both wide) and they were off of free kicks. Another solid performance in the middle, with a Bonjour goal to top it off.

Chris said: I really didn't like the Harvey for Chiumiento sub. Replacing a good possession player with... well, with Jordan Harvey when you're trying to defend a lead, is not a solid plan to me.

Tyler Green tweeted these last night:

1/3 Tweeted earlier about #whitecapsFC defender Jordan Harvey... @IrfaanGaffar talking about his defensive specialist.

2/3 In two of his last 3 games, Harvey has come on and the opposition has scored

3/3 - v Houston, #WhitecapsFC Jordan Harvey comes on 78th – Houston score in 83rd. v NY, Harvey comes on in 80th - #NYRB’s score 86th.

It's a disconcerting trend that Harvey has going. Chiumiento definitely shouldn't have come off for Harvey.

Boxing_Day_Massacre said: Hate to say it but their #19 beat Rochat on speed at least a couple of times. First time I can remember seeing that all season.

Dane Richards is one of the fastest guys in MLS. No disgrace in getting beat for pace by him occasionally, and Rochat seemed to adjust as the night went on.

Ya I agree but Rennie is completely over the moon with Le Toux n Davidson unless they both were dying I can't see Rennie taking them off in a game...u gotta wonder when will or if Camilo turns things around he had two solid chances

Bad_Gones said: Go back and look at both the goals that came after Harvey coming on. If you can pick out why he was responsible for either of them you're seeing something I'm not. (Not saying you won't, just that I can't pick anything out to pin on Jordan.)

Dede had run a tonne and we're playing again Saturday. I thought it was an unexpected sub, but not one that I would say cost us two points. In fact, I thought Rennie handled the subs pretty well (you gotta give Tan some time, right?). I expected Hassli to come on around the 75' mark, so 64' is pretty agressive for us.

Looking back at the Houston goal Harvey could have checked Moffat better to prevent the bounce off of Demerit, and last night he could possibly have stayed by the post longer but that one is being nitpicky.

I'm not saying Harvey is directly responsible for both goals, it just seems like we're a much weaker team with him on the left flank. Chiumiento has been playing spectacularly the past few games and to have him taken off for Harvey is a huge loss. Granted, I don't quite know who else we could use to replace Chiumiento. Maybe it's Tiebert time?

Le Toux knows he will start every game, regardless of whether he's scoring or not. Camilo and Hassli know that they are unlikely to start, and if they do they have to score and play mistake-free in order to get a start next game. Am I wrong in thinking this?

Would Camilo have been more relaxed, and therefore more likely to score, if he didn't feel the pressure to score at least one goal in this game? Or is his style the same, whether he's playing regularly or not?

Would Hassli be more confident and more effective if he knew he was starting every other game?

When was the last time Camillo had any meaningful minutes? I think there was just a bit of game rust there.

Game rust, yes, and the referee also allowed a good bit of physicality. I bet at least half of those 10 giveaways were the result of a NY player just bodying Camilo off the ball. I thought the ref was really quite good last night, but thought he did miss a couple of times where Camilo was fouled.

Was a bit disapointed how "Eric Hassli clap clap clap..." came several times immediately after a Camilo miss.
How is the "Lifting every WhitecapsFC player if times get tough" ? (Tietur's "Supporters Pledge")
Believe me, I'm no big fan of Camilo but you gotta do your best to support the guy if he's in the chosen 11.

Boxing_Day_Massacre said: Was a bit disapointed how "Eric Hassli clap clap clap..." came several times immediately after a Camilo miss.
How is the "Lifting every WhitecapsFC player if times get tough" ? (Tietur's "Supporters Pledge")
Believe me, I'm no big fan of Camilo but you gotta do your best to support the guy if he's in the chosen 11.

Agreed, especially when it was first heard in the 50th minute. It's an easy chant, and casual fans know and love Hassli.

Camilo needed to come off, and putting Le Toux on the right side was a smart move, I thought, as Camilo was so poor defending in front of Lee. His defensive efforts extended to jogging back to remain near his mark and glancing occasionally at him so he could remain near him.

I didn't hear the Barry Robson chant going, but did hear the Hassli chant, pretty down right rude to Camilo.

One chant that was driving me nuts was the 4 drunk teenagers going "one more goal!" over and over and over and over.........

Sat in 239 last night, first time we weren't in the SS. I was amazed just how LOUD you guys were. It's hard to gauge that when you're in the midst of it game after game.

We brought a couple first timers to both the Saturday game and again last night. All four of us agreed that while the view was great in 239 we had a much better time in 251 on Saturday and the SS is the place to be.

Harvey gave the ball away on a counter 2 minutes before the goal right at the top of the NY 18 - Dede would've settled the play and killed time. That said, Dede looked absolutely spent chasing Richards down the wing just before he came on. In the future I imagine it will be Gersh, JMD or Thor coming on for Dede and holding that ball. We need that fresh possession MF to kill that time and apparently Rennie doesn't believe that to be Nano.

ETA - how do you leave a man to get a short corner at that point of the match? Looked like Gersh missed that assignment and LeToux seemed to fall asleep for the one second it takes to allow a goal. I think the missed assignments were easy to spot and the players who made them work too hard to be singled out by the coach.

Neeskens1974 said: ... Unfortunately we don't have a Camilo chant that can get the crowd supporting everyone...

Camilo, was Sanvezzo
Now it's Camilo, not Sanvezzo
Call him Camilo.....
Put it in the net

Edit: Sorry, I guess this belongs in the official chants thread

The Canadian Women's National Team was outside the stadium before the game.

SAFC_Yank said:

Boxing_Day_Massacre said: Hate to say it but their #19 beat Rochat on speed at least a couple of times. First time I can remember seeing that all season.

Dane Richards is one of the fastest guys in MLS. No disgrace in getting beat for pace by him occasionally, and Rochat seemed to adjust as the night went on.

Early in the game they had him wide on the wing. When they moved him to the middle I nearly needed a change of underwear. He was going past any defender we have in cruise control mode. He is a very quick player and hard to mark.

PS. Lovely pics of the ladies. Damn they are hot!

On the march I was pretty sure I saw Sophie Schmidt walking across the street from us and looking at us like we were retards. I thought "probably isn't her". In hindsight, I should have tried to start "holy Schmidt!"