Orlando City at New York Red Bulls: Five Takeaways

Orlando City went into the match against the New York Red Bulls without Jonathan Spector and without Dom Dwyer, so getting something from the game was always going to be tough. Every point is important for the Lions as they try to climb back into playoff contention, but it wasn’t to be in this away match. Here are our five takeaways from the 3-1 loss to New York.

New Match, Same Old thing

The trend for Orlando City has been the following: score early, give up an equalizer, and then give up three points in either the first 15 minutes of the second half, or the last 15 minutes of the game. This time the Lions managed to do all of it. Carlos Rivas scored in the 18th minute on the second of two good opportunities up until that point. It’s something we’ve seen recently. It would take only until the 30th minute for New York to equalize, and then the second half blues would strike again. New York scored in the first 15 minutes and the last 15 minutes of the second half. This is a problem that needs to get fixed.

Plenty of Chances

Orlando City had several opportunities to either tie or win this match. Yoshimar Yotún missed a golden opportunity, Rivas barely missed a chip shot, Antonio Nocerino missed just wide, Cyle Larin missed a header, and that’s just the ones I can think of off the top of my head. This has been a thing for Orlando City this year. Last year they scored a bunch; this year, not so much. One thing we lamented recently was the Lions not getting enough opportunities in the final third. Well, I guess this is progress?

Yotún Impresses

I know that he missed the goal, but otherwise he did a very good job in his Orlando City debut. Given the amount of time he had to practice with the squad, he did a good job of passing, getting into good positions, helping on defense, connecting the defense to the offense, and even getting that one chance he missed. It wasn’t the result we wanted, but Yoshi impressed me tonight.

Back Line Missed Spector

Léo Pereira and Tommy Redding started the game pretty well. There were clearances, and they seemed to be doing a good job of keeping New York in check. Then Léo Pereira tried a little to hard, and gave up an own-goal. Things went downhill from there. I can’t say for certain that Spector wouldn’t have given up that own-goal, but I’d be willing to bet some money on it. We knew he would be missed, but despite that I think both Redding and Pereira played pretty well. Hopefully, that will improve, as Spector is still out for at least one week, if not two.

Kaká’s Red Card

The game got pretty chippy after the third New York goal. Orlando City was obviously frustrated, and both sides didn’t do the best job of keeping their heads. Even Kaká chided Sacha Kljestan for being a crybaby. However, he was mainly a calming influence, and for that he was red carded. Despite having all the time in the world because of VAR, the captain was given a straight red card for hands to the face of Aurélien Collin. This is despite every other human being watching the same footage being able to tell that it was two friends just messing around. It is very likely this gets overturned, but it was exactly the ending that one would expect from this night.

Those are my five takeaways. If there was something you think we missed or want to add, please comment below. As for me, I’m done with this night. I think I’ll watch something less controversial, like Louie CK. That should really tell you everything.