Rongen wants TFC Academy to be an MLS leader
After his hiring was announced almost as an afterthought at a Toronto FC press conference in early January, new Academy Director Thomas Rongen’s first appearance went under the radar at the club’s recent media day as well.

The Academy side was placed in a separate area. Rongen stood in near anonymity beside academy coaches Danny Dichio and Jim Brennan.

Rongen is not an unknown in league circles being a former coach of four different clubs. The position, however, is somewhat new for him, but he’s had plenty of experience dealing with young players as the head coach of US U-20 men’s national team, leading the team to World Cups in 2007 and 2009.

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In what was their first spell of competitive action since the start of preseason training two weeks ago, Whitecaps FC took the lead in the opening seconds of the friendly contest through last season’s top goalscorer Camilo Sanvezzo. Seattle earned the draw early in the second period of play, as midfielder Servando Carrasco equalized just after the break. While there were further chances at both ends, these two Cascadia Cup rivals had to settle for a stalemate on a warm and sunny winter’s day in The Grand Canyon State.

With Monday’s training match coming in the early stages of preseason for both Major League Soccer clubs, Vancouver and Seattle agreed to an extended 120-minute match that included two periods of 45 minutes, plus an additional period of 30 minutes after that. The format allowed the ‘Caps and Sounders FC to play a different line-up in each of the three periods of play, as both coaching staffs took a closer look at their respective training camp rosters in competitive action.

The first 45 minutes saw both sides play their strongest line-ups, with Whitecaps FC making an explosive start to the match from the opening kickoff. Just 35 seconds in, Atiba Harris set up fellow striker Camilo to give Vancouver an early 1-0 lead.

The first-minute goal livened proceedings among both sides in the first 45-minute period, as the match referee issued yellow cards to Harris and ‘Caps teammate Martin Bonjour, while former Vancouver centre back Jeff Parke was booked for Seattle. The last chance of the first period fell to Whitecaps FC striker Eric Hassli, but the Frenchman’s low shot was tipped around the post by Seattle’s Austrian international goalkeeper Michael Gspurning.

Following the first break and a first change of line-ups, Seattle levelled matters from a ‘Caps turnover, as David Estrada set up Carrasco to beat Whitecaps FC goalkeeper Brad Knighton from close range for a 1-1 scoreline on 48 minutes.

The second 45-minute period was evenly contested, with Vancouver creating chances through youngster Omar Salgado. In fact, the United States youth international’s shot in the 88th-minute found the back of the net after deflecting off his teammate Floyd Franks. However, Franks was in an offside position and the goal was called back.

Following a second break and a second change of line-ups, Whitecaps FC’s third-period XI had opportunities to win the match, with midfielder Michael Nanchoff forcing Sounders FC goalkeeper Bryan Meredith into a fine save from his free-kick strike on 113 minutes, while Residency product Caleb Clarke struck a shot over the crossbar in the Seattle box six minutes later. There was also a red card to Sounders FC’s Jason Banton for a late challenge, but both clubs agreed to allow Carrasco to replace him to see out the dying stages of the game with even numbers.

Whitecaps FC will continue training at Grande Sport World throughout the remainder of this week before facing MLS Western Conference rivals Real Salt Lake in their second training match of preseason on Friday morning. Kickoff from Casa Grande, Arizona, is set for 10 a.m. PT.

Whitecaps FC 2012 Major League Soccer season tickets start at $329, plus applicable tax and a $10 processing fee per order. To secure a seat and for additional information about Whitecaps FC MLS season tickets, including loge seats and suites, call 604.669.9283 or visit whitecapsfc.com/tickets.

Scoring Summary:
1′ – VAN – Camilo Sanvezzo (Atiba Harris)
48′ – SEA – Servando Carrasco (David Estrada)

Cautions:
4′ – VAN – Atiba Harris
14′ – VAN – Martin Bonjour
20′ – SEA – Jeff Parke
77′ – VAN – Michael Boxall
94′ – SEA – Alex Caskey
101′ – SEA – Andrew Vanzie
103′ – VAN – Russell Teibert
110′ – VAN – Patrick Cregg
119′ – SEA – Harlinton Gutierres

Ejections:
116′ – SEA – Jason Banton

Vancouver Whitecaps FC
Group 1: 1.Joe Cannon; 12.Young-Pyo Lee, 15.Martin Bonjour, 6.Jay DeMerit, 4.Alain Rochat; 9.Atiba Harris, 27.Jun Marques Davidson, 11.John Thorrington, 37.Camilo Sanvezzo; 7.Sebastien Le Toux, 29.Eric Hassli

Group 2: 18.Brad Knighton; 32.Greg Klazura, 19.Carlyle Mitchell, 2.Michael Boxall, 3.Jordan Harvey; 14.Lee Nguyen, 43.Floyd Franks, 28.Gershon Koffie, 22.Darren Mattocks; 20.Davide Chiumiento, 17.Omar Salgado

Group 3: Andrew Fontein; 26.Chris Estridge, 30.Bilal Duckett, 19. Carlyle Mitchell, 31.Russell Teibert; 23.Long Tan, 43.Floyd Franks (36.Bryce Alderson 106’), 41.Patrick Cregg; 13.Michael Nanchoff; 16.Matt Watson, Darren Mattocks (34.Caleb Clarke 106’)

Seattle Sounders FC
Group 1: Michael Gspurning, Adam Johansson, Jeff Parke, Jhon Kennedy Hurtado, Leo Gonzalez, Mauro Rosales, Osvaldo Alonso, Brad Evans, Alvaro Fernandez, Fredy Montero, Mike Fucito (Roger Levesque 29’)

Group 2: Andrew Weber, Wes Fieghner, Zach Scott, Andrew Duran, Marc Burch, Michael Seamon, Servando Carrasco, Andy Rose, Lamar Neagle, David Estrada, Sammy Ochoa

Group 3: Bryan Meredith, Amadou Sanyang, Tim Pontius, Harlinton Gutierres, Ever Alvarado, Cordell Cato, Andrew Vanzie, Alex Caskey, Jason Banton (Servando Carrasco 116’), Roger Levesque, Babayele Sodade

Struggling Impact season ticket numbers a blessing in disguise?
2012 is shaping up to what could be the best year of Canadian football in recent memory. The women’s national team appears back on track heading to the London Olympics, the Men’s national team, buoyed by the potential addition of dynamic midfielder Jonathan De Guzman, are positioned to make progress in the third round of World Cup Qualifying, and for the first time since 1983 there are top flight teams in Canada spanning coast to coast.

The three domestic teams of Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal are proving to be a huge part of a renaissance in optimism, as all are committed to youth development, operating with a highly professional approach and delivering a top notch looking product. However, despite this, the number of fans and supporters prepared to commit their money to season’s tickets do not parallel the ascent for growth of the game in Canada.

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RedNation recently had the chance to catch up with Dr. Hill to discuss the state of match fixing in 2012 and to get his thoughts on developments in his field of expertise since The Fix was published.

RedNation Online: The Fix was first published in September, 2008 and the last time I spoke to you was June of 2010. I guess an obvious first question is: have things improved at all since your book was published?

Declan Hill: Oh gosh, yes. I mean unbelievably so. When it came out, I think maybe 50% of people said “This is a problem and we have to deal with it” and the other 50% said “Who is this guy?” and “This is complete crap”, etc. And what has happened is that the second critical 50% has just evaporated like snow in May, mostly because of the Organized Crime Task Force in Bochum, Germany. I had taught a couple of their detectives in Vienna at a corruption school and, when the book came out, they were like we know him and he is okay. And they launched an investigation and it basically revealed that not only had I told the truth, I had actually been moderate in what I had written compared to what was actually going on. They discovered over 250 games that had been fixed in nine different countries, including the European Championships, World Cup qualifiers, all the way down to a game featuring 16 year olds in Germany.

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TFC A TOUGH SELL IN 2012
When Toronto FC entered MLS in 2007, the club seemed to capture the imagination of Toronto’s football watching community, with those fun Jim Brennan and Chris Pozniak TV commercials and other adverts getting people interested.

It worked very well and obviously for the first few years, despite the team’s poor results on the pitch, the buzz and the crowd remained. There was very little advertising to notice, but there just didn’t have to be.

As we all know, this season is starting off with a match that required selling twice as many tickets than any other TFC home game so there was obviously a lot more of a media push. Those ads with Torsten Frings and Landon Donovan and David Beckham, while not quite ubiquitous, were a lot more prominent for a week or two to the general public, before dying down as the Rogers Centre nears sell-out status.

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