March 19, 2011 The debut season for Vancouver Whitecaps in MLS!!!

This is the first time I have a home soccer team to support! I have never had any interest in Vancouver Whitecaps when they played in USSF before they joined the Major League Soccer, the top quality soocer league in America/Canada. I have never paid attention to the MLS, but I will be a fan for Whitecaps beginning this 2011 MLS season. I will watch most every Whitecaps games on TV as Sportsnets and TSN will air every single game, but I may consider to go to the live games but probably won't go there until the completion for rennovation of BC Place Stadium in September. BC Place Staudium will have a new retractable roof, the world largest of its kind and fans/players will have no worry games being affected by the frequent rainfall in BC. For now till September, all the home games will be played in Empire Field in Burnaby and I have heard that 15,000 out of 25,000+ season tickets have already be sold out.

When talking about MLS, most non-MLS fans will think of David Beckham, Thierry Henry and Landon Donvan. Certainly. Certainly, there are more fascination in the 16 year-old MLS league than a few soon-over-the-hill stars. There are many quality lessor-unknown/under-rated players and dedicated teams attempting to develop teams in the right way! Unlike European football leagues, MLS have salary caps system which restricts teams from spending crazy money to buy a team of star players for instant success. There are draft picks for lowest ranked teams to draft most talented young players every year and temas bascially have to improve their teams through intelligent scouting and internal players development. There are restrictions for number of foreign players signings and teams need to possess around 10 local players (includes Canadian and Americans) in their squad. Of course, every team is allowed to sign 2 designated players which can go over the basic salary (e.g. Beckham and Henry).

There are now 18 teams in the league allocated to Eastern and Western Conference. 10 teams can make the playoffs. Top 3 teams from each conference can make the play-offs; the four teams with the next best point totals will play one-match knockout games to determine the final participant for each conference. The defending MLS champion is Colorado Rapids despite only achieving 7th place in the regular season in 2010. The champion of MLS can qualify for Concacf Champion League to fight with all the top teams in the North and Central American Leagues. The champion of the Concacf Champion League can participate in FIFA Club World Cup to compete with all the champions from Champion League winners from different continents around the world.

Can Vancouver Whitecaps make the FIFA Club World Cup one day? This may be a wild dream, but we certainly do not lack the dedication under our new 4-mean ownership team which includes Steve Nash. For the debut season, we will do extremely well if we can make the last pay-off spot. Realistically, we may only develop into a hard-to-beat defensive solid team with a growing fan base in our long anticpiated debut MLS season.