Ahead of Thursday’s FIFA Congress, it was difficult to get near the Vancouver Convention Centre without hearing a consistent sound: Whitecaps fans singing and chanting outside the entrance, voicing frustration and anxiety over the MLS team’s future.
News of the MLS team’s possible relocation to Las Vegas broke via The Athletic just before the Congress began. The uncertainty over a for-sale club whose stadium lease expires after this year and is bereft of local alternatives led to Thursday’s protest.
“If the Whitecaps left Vancouver I think we’d lose a sense of community that’s been around for years,” Maayan Zilbershtein, co-founder of the Vancouver Albion supporters group and who was at the protest, said. “The Whitecaps mean a lot to this city and to people like myself who have spent so much time and money on supporting this team. It would leave an empty space in the city of Vancouver.”
So much of the surrounding talk was not about the topics in the Congress itself or even the upcoming World Cup hosted in Vancouver, but the Whitecaps’ future in the city. It is a future that continues to feel tenuous, and leads to a question: what would happen if the Whitecaps left?
The ramifications stretch well beyond MLS.
Vancouver’s reputation as a sports city would continue to take a hit. Anecdotally, it’s not always seen as an elite sports hub in Canada. Vancouver lost the NBA’s Grizzlies after just six seasons in 2001. Sinking attendance, a poor record and a slumping Canadian dollar, among other reasons, led to the franchise being relocated to Memphis. As it stands, Vancouver’s new bid for an MLB expansion team seems optimistic at best.
The city’s sporting narrative often glances back to two riots that occurred 17 years apart, when the Canucks lost two Game 7s of the Stanley Cup Finals.
More recently, the Canucks have qualified for the playoffs just once in the past six seasons and after a last-place NHL finish this season, hope remains in short supply.
And yet for all the reasons to lack confidence in the Canucks, let’s remember the team had the seventh-highest average attendance in the NHL this season. The Whitecaps have had the second-most total fans attend their home games in 2026. Conversely, to the east, CF Montréal has had the lowest MLS home attendance of all teams this season. This is not an issue of resonance in the community; it’s one of economics, politics and business.
Fans in Vancouver show up. The numbers suggest they’re not a fair-weather bunch. Losing the Whitecaps might further the notion that Vancouver is not a sports city, but, frankly, that just ain’t right.
If the Whitecaps do head south of the border, the impact to Canadian soccer would be immense. Canada is a relatively young soccer country. The men’s national team’s ascent only truly began once MLS arrived in 2007.
An academy system based out of one of the nation’s largest cities – which services a sizable chunk of the country without nearby professional academy options – would immediately vanish. Canadian Premier League side Vancouver FC (based in nearby Langley, British Columbia) does not yet offer an academy program that stretches to young teenagers the way the Whitecaps academy does. Vancouver is a largely isolated city within Canada. It does not have nearby cities with professional academies and playing opportunities like, say, Toronto and Montreal.
Without a professional academy setup to attract and maintain the top young players from British Columbia and beyond, a generation’s worth of growth would be stunted.
Alphonso Davies moved from Edmonton to Vancouver as a teenager to develop in the Whitecaps academy. His ascent to one of the best left backs in the world and captain of a team in a home World Cup was made possible because of his development in a Canadian MLS setting. That’s the kind of thing the national team could be missing if the Whitecaps relocate to Las Vegas.
Alphonso Davies’ road to stardom began with the Vancouver Whitecaps. (Christopher Morris / Corbis / Getty Images)
The Government of British Columbia will benefit from the millions of tourism dollars injected into the province when the masses arrive in Vancouver this summer, in part to see Davies lead Canada as World Cup captain. Losing the next Davies remains a prospect the entire province should be concerned about.
There are others, too: Theo Bair and Sam Adekugbe both developed at the Whitecaps academy and are in contention for a World Cup roster spot. That’s not to mention the dozens of professional players developed within the Whitecaps system. Eliminate professional coaches and Canada’s national team could see players fall by the wayside. Talented young players could be forced to head abroad or drop out of the sport altogether.
Canada’s national team and player pool are in a good spot because, in part, of a generation’s worth of player development and growth in one of the country’s three MLS academies. Should the Whitecaps head to Las Vegas or any other U.S. suitor, we might not see the negative impact in Canada’s player pool right away. But years down the line, we almost surely would.
Perhaps the Whitecaps leaving the city would force the CPL to invest more heavily in the Vancouver area. That could include expanding into the metro Vancouver area and expediting academy plans. If the worst-case scenario unfolds for the Whitecaps, there is an opportunity for the CPL; however, picking up where the Whitecaps left off would be a considerable and heavy lift for a league playing just its eighth season.
And so the future of the Whitecaps should be considered well beyond the borders of Vancouver. Uprooting a team of their history and ties within Canadian soccer would be devastating. Replacing those roots might set the sport back years.
“With the team having been around in some form since 1974,” Zilbershtein said, “it’s played a huge part in the lives of many people from all different generations.”
Elsewhere around MLS with another matchday in the books:
Guillermo Hoyos cut a frustrated figure in Miami. (Chris Arjoon / Icon Sportswire / Getty Images)
From bad to worse at home for Miami
The first goal at Nu Stadium belongs to Austin FC’s Guilherme Biro. The first hat trick belongs to Orlando City’s Martín Ojeda. The first win belongs to Orlando City and the first loss, well, that dubious honor belongs to Inter Miami, whose new cathedral has thus far been more of a house of horrors than a comfort zone.
Saturday night, Miami lost a wild game at home to rival Orlando City, 4-3, despite racing out to a 3-0 lead after 33 minutes. That marks four games at Nu Stadium and Miami is still searching for a first win.
Miami was rampant against an Orlando defense that has conceded more goals than any in the league (and is still on pace to be the worst in MLS history), but the hosts then swiftly collapsed in the second half.
Ojeda scored the first three goals and, once he leveled the match 3-3 from the penalty spot in the 78th minute, it was Orlando that created a few more big chances and looked the more likely to win. Sure enough, the stoppage-time winner came from Tyrese Spicer.
Miami hasn’t changed all that much under interim coach Guilermo Hoyos, and he hasn’t shown all that much impetus to do so. It plays with an extra natural defender (five instead of four, with fullbacks in wingback roles rather than wingers) and Luis Suárez has an increased importance.
It’s not a huge shock that there isn’t much to speak of tactically. Hoyos himself has said he is merely a “guide” for “the best coach in the world” on the field: Lionel Messi.
Well, Messi can’t make substitutions, and Hoyos left a few on the table Saturday, making only two changes and none in the final 19 minutes plus stoppage time when Orlando took firm control. And beyond that, hardly any accountability followed.
Upon the final whistle and with the collapse confirmed, Messi darted straight for the tunnel. The broadcast camera picked him up there literal seconds after the result went final. Hoyos took precisely one question in his postmatch press conference (“these defeats make real men,” he said in Spanish.) As always, Messi did not speak. Neither did Suárez nor Rodrigo De Paul, the club’s biggest players and leaders and highest earners.
This is not just presently a team without answers — it’s one that doesn’t want to face any questions, either.
Rising star Zavier Gozo is making an impact for Real Salt Lake. (Alex Goodlett / Getty Images)
The eclectic makeup of RSL’s formidable attack
The remade 2026 Real Salt Lake attack was a tidal wave this weekend, overwhelming the Portland Timbers en route to a smooth 2-0 win. With all the chances created, the only surprise is that the final scoreline wasn’t more flattering for the hosts.
The concoction of first-choice attackers is a fascinating case study in roster building:
Attacking midfielder Diego Luna, a rising talent signed from USL Championship and is now a regular with the U.S. national team.
No. 10 Morgan Guilavogi, a Designated Player signed for a $5 million fee from Europe
Forward Sergi Solans, selected with the No. 30 (!) selection at the 2025 MLS SuperDraft out of UCLA.
Wingback/winger Zavier Gozo, academy graduate (and destined for a big-money European move).
Wingback/winger Juan Sanabria, signed from Liga MX on a TAM deal.
Those five players suffocated Portland en route to eight big chances created. The club is tied for eighth in the league in goals scored (19) but third in xG. Saturday marked the first time all season those five players started together, too, so there is room for growth.
It’s a different identity than a Pablo Mastroeni-led side has featured in years. That theme is normal. This is a group that seemingly has to be constantly remade every 18 months with different restrictions, and sporting director Kurt Schmid deserves a lot of credit.
Schmid arrived in 2021 and the team has made the playoffs every year, including time with no defined owner in 2021 and thus no discretionary budget. RSL has overseen a number of key outbound transfers during that time, including Andres Gomez (Stade Rennais, $11 million plus add-ons) and Fidel Barajas (Chivas, $4 million).
Gozo will be next and Luna likely will one day too. And RSL will have to remake itself once again, something Schmid, Mastroeni and company have proved capable of doing.
Wilfried Zaha’s Charlotte FC contract expires next month (Edward Finan / Imagn Images)
Zaha, Charlotte in talks as contract winds down
Charlotte FC and winger Wilfried Zaha are in active talks over a new contract, but no agreement has been reached yet, sources briefed on the situation tell The Athletic.
Zaha is out of contract on June 30, halfway through the 2026 MLS season. He is one of Charlotte’s three designated players.
The 33-year-old former Crystal Palace star joined the club ahead of the 2025 season from Galatasaray following a loan to Lyon. He has made 42 appearances (40 regular season, two playoffs) since joining, leading Charlotte to the postseason last year but missing a first-round game due to a red card suspension.
Zaha has 12 goals and 14 assists during his time with the club.