Good Friday morning, Caps fans, hope you all are having a lovely week and that you are gearing up for an enjoyable weekend.

The first competitive match of the year didn’t quite end up the way the Whitecaps would have hoped, as they slugged it out in a 0-0 draw against Cartagines. It was a vintage CONCACAF fixture, with a well-drilled opponent content to frustrate the Caps by pulling out all of the gamesmanship stops.

Vancouver was certainly the better side, but the home team did well to limit the number of dangerous chances the Caps were able to create. Some sloppy play and a lack of incisiveness from the attacking players meant the Caps also limited the number of dangerous chances the Caps were able to create.

I’m not hitting the panic button, as this was similar to how things went against Saprissa last year. The Caps showed growing pains in that one and yet were easily able to turn things around at BC Place. A win of any kind will ensure they advance next week; if they can’t do that, they weren’t likely going to do much damage in this competition anyway.

There were some positives ahead...