The Vancouver Whitecaps has parted with head coach Vanni Sartini, the MLS team announced Monday.
Sartini first took over the Canadian club as an interim coach during the 2021 season, replacing Marc Dos Santos, earning the job on a permanent basis after getting the team into the postseason. In total, Sartini led the Whitecaps to the MLS Cup playoffs in 2021, 2023, and 2024, falling in the first round of each instalment.
In a press release, Vancouver framed this as a mutual parting of ways. However, sporting director Axel Schuster seemed to position this as his own determination in a quote from the team’s official announcement.
“I took my time with this decision, and it was not taken lightly,” Schuster wrote. “We have taken important steps each year and it is now the right time for someone else to lead this group on the pitch with fresh and new energy. We have started the process to find our next head coach as we look to take the next step and build a championship contender in MLS, as well as continental tournaments.”
While three first-round exits in four seasons are not exactly a robust return, it is worth remembering the Whitecaps team that Sartini inherited. Vancouver made just one trip to the playoffs from 2016 through 2020, and looked likely to repeat that ineffectiveness before he took over the squad in 2021. The Whitecaps had also failed to win the Canadian Championship in the same five-year span, but Sartini led the team to triumphs in the domestic cup in 2022, 2023 and 2024.
Sartini also worked with a roster that was compiled on a relatively lean budget and with frequent squad turnover under Schuster’s operation. Vancouver remained competitive under the Italian thanks in large part to the attacking tandem of Ryan Gauld and Brian White, who joined the club in 2021 and became one of the league’s strongest forward partnerships.
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While this year’s squad ranked 12th in salary expenditure, the Whitecaps have been infamous for perceived low investment via transfer fees and updating the academy, particularly in the years following homegrown wing-back Alphonso Davies’ sale to Bayern Munich in January 2019 for an initial $13.5million with performance bonuses that may have risen up to $22m.
Under Sartini, the Whitecaps became one of MLS’s most watchable teams for neutral viewers. His system generated plenty of chances, though the Whitecaps fell from sixth in chances created per game in 2023 to 18th in 2024. It appears that Schuster and Kerfoot believed that this team had reached its ceiling under his guidance: a side that could consistently qualify for the playoffs and win the domestic cup, but struggle to truly square up against MLS’s top teams.
Sartini became a frequent topic of discussion for MLS’s disciplinary committee. In November 2023, the league issued a six-game suspension after the coach made questionable comments about an officiating decision by referee Tim Ford. The Whitecaps’ match on Nov. 5 ended in controversy, as Ford blocked a Whitecaps player from picking up a loose ball on a corner kick, contributing to an LAFC counter-attack that ended in a goal that was eventually ruled out for offside.
After the match, Sartini said of the officiating: “If they found (Ford) in False Creek then I’m going to be a suspect. I’m not saying that I would do it, I’m saying I’m the first suspect — it’s different.”
Sartini was clear he was joking, but it did not land well. At other times in the press conference, Sartini called the referee’s performance “shameful,” “a disgrace,” and “f—ing horrible.” MLS eventually reduced his suspension by two games, and he coached his first match of the 2024 season on March 23.
Vancouver now has one of three current MLS coaching vacancies, joining Atlanta United and the Philadelphia Union.
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(Top photo: Jeff Vinnick/Getty Images)
