VANCOUVER, BC - With the summer transfer window now open, it's a busy and exciting time in Major League Soccer.
Big name players like Steven Gerrard, Frank Lampard and Andrea Pirlo are set to make a splash and follow in the footsteps of fellow MLS debutants like Kaká and David Villa this season.
These signings may cause a buzz but for markets like Vancouver, they lead to the inevitable questions around when the Whitecaps could add such a marquee signing.
The 'Caps owners and executives are not ruling one out, but spending a lot of money on an ageing player doesn't fit in with the current strategic model for the club of developing their own young talent, supplemented by some hidden gems produced from their scouting.
"When are we going to spend the big money on the Giovincos and such?" Whitecaps president Bob Lenarduzzi pondered at an executive media roundtable on Monday. "Well, you know what, we may at some point.
"But realistically, we are a club that’s going to develop players. We want to be known around the world and be compared to an Ajax, or Lyon in France, that actually do a great job of developing players and are very competitive along the way."
The Whitecaps approach leads the league in that regard, with eight Homegrown players currently on Vancouver's MLS roster. Developing a group of young players that will give the 'Caps a solid core for many years to come is the philosophy that head coach Carl Robinson has put into place.
That doesn't mean that the Whitecaps won't look at adding one or more big name signings to bolster that young group, but it has to be the right fit and won't be a "knee jerk" reaction to what is going on elsewhere.
But Whitecaps co-owner Jeff Mallett admits that it is tempting to open the check book.
"Absolutely we look at it," Mallett confirmed. "We constantly look at it. We’re never surprised at what comes into the league. We never say, ‘We wish we could’ or ‘Wow, how they’d get that person?’ With Robbo’s connections, with [assistant coach] Martyn [Pert’s] connections, with Bobby’s connections, with my connections at Derby [County], we hear a lot.
"We choose to make our decisions on our own but it's not like we say 'we wish we had the money', 'we wish we had the stadium', 'I wish something'. We have every opportunity to make any move we want going forward but again, we're trying to balance."
Mallett confirmed that if Robinson and his management team identify a player that they feel could be the difference maker to not just making the MLS postseason this year, but going deep in it, then they'll look to see if they can make it work.
"There's 14 matches to go in MLS," Mallett said. "It's going to be a dogfight right to the end, we know that. We've got to try and put ourselves in a position to challenge for the West. There's no reason why at this point, 20 matches in, we couldn't and shouldn't."
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As for just how much money Robinson will have at his disposal for looking this window, there's no set figure, but any signing is about more than just the monetary aspect to the club.
"We never give a fixed number," Mallett said. "We're absolutely looking but we're realistic to what our market can bear and what can happen. We don't go in and say what's the fixed number, we say what's the weakness in the club, what's the best player we can bring in? There's a checklist of things that go on. We don't say if you can find something for that good luck, if not..."
While the club acknowledge that Vancouver may not be the number one location of choice for a number of the world's top stars, for a variety of factors, that's not going to stop them trying to compete with the LAs and New Yorks of the league.
"If you wanted to do the math, you could say we're a small DMA [Designated Market Area]," Mallett added. "We could cuddle up and get small, but we don't think that way."
