Loons scrap to a scoreless draw with first-place Vancouver

Minnesota United goalkeeper Dayne St Clair on Tuesday shared how one primary goal carries over to this Vancouver match Don t loose to a squad twice in one season Coming off a - home defeat to the Whitecaps on April the Loons achieved the aim with a - draw with Vancouver on Wednesday at BC Place But MNUFC - - points fell short of St Clair s next objective moving ahead of first-place Vancouver - - points by the end of the week That would have taken a win over the Caps and a preeminence over Seattle on Sunday Here are three takeaways Less than best Last month Vancouver had a Concacaf Champions Cup semifinal against Inter Miami three days after playing Minnesota and rotated its lineup to focus on the hemispheric tournament But as more regulars subbed into the second half in April the Whitecaps rolled to accomplishment Vancouver again put out less-than-its-best lineup with the Concacaf final vs Cruz Azul coming Sunday and were still able to extend its unbeaten MLS run to straight games on Wednesday Minnesota rolled out a top tier stating lineup but didn t look like the better group especially in the first half Extremely flat captain Michael Boxall explained There was a similar self-critique from Loons players and staff after the Vancouver encounter in April as well Toothless Minnesota s attack was especially disjointed in the first half and head Eric Ramsay subbed in forward Tani Oluwaseyi for midfielder Robin Lod and exchanged wingbacks Julian Gressel for Bongi Hlongwane at halftime MNUFC s offense was better to start the second half but still didn t generate much threats in front of goal Vancouver outshot Minnesota - overall and - on target Whilst it s one of those performances that we will be rueing a lot of how we used the ball Ramsay commented We will be really frustrated with ourselves with just the number of easy giveaways and unforced errors that led to the performance feeling like it lacked any fluency what so ever As utility lacked to the forwards neither Kelvin Yeboah or Oluwaseyi managed a single shot Not all is lost Visiting teams have left British Columbia with points in only three of eight games this season including Minnesota The Loons defense was the reason for that While Vancouver had a volume of shots they lacked quality and Clair added to his MLS-best shutout total eight Top scorer Brian White had only one shot in his -minute shift We know our job on the other side of the ball Boxall explained As the championship went on we had to grind that one out There were a sparse scary moments in there in our box but the boys were putting their bodies on the line to protect Dayne s goal so all on all it could be an vital point Three tidbits Midfielder Owen Gene was named to the Guadeloupe preliminary roster for the Concacaf Gold Cup in June but the -year-old says he is leaning toward staying with MNUFC next month to help solidify a spot in the first squad Darius Randell received his fourth loan call-up from MNUFC to MNUFC for Wednesday s match the -year-old didn t get off the bench in three of those games Joseph Rosales and Emmanuel Sabbi did not have a repeat occurrence in this match Last month Sabbi accused Rolales of saying a discriminatory comment toward him and it led to Rosales who denied the allegation being suspended three games by MLS The biggest occurrence between the two on Wednesday appeared to be nothing more than a tackle