Orlando City
Orlando City vs. Atlanta United FC: Final Score 2-1 as Lions’ Win Streak is Snapped at Six
Lions fall behind again and this time the rally falls short.
Orlando City fell behind again but this time the Lions couldn’t climb the mountain. A soft, first-half penalty against Cristian Higuita allowed Josef Martinez to give Atlanta United an early lead and the visitors doubled through Ezequiel Barco in the first half en route to a 2-1 win in front of 24,232 rain-soaked fans at Orlando City Stadium.
On the plus side, Orlando (6-3-1, 19 points) looked like it belonged on the pitch with Supporters’ Shield-leading Atlanta (8-2-1, 25 points) and Justin Meram opened his account with his first goal in purple.
And, sadly, the Lions lost at least 90 seconds worth of time to find an equalizer due to a shower of debris from fans frustrated by the inconsistency of referee Alan Kelly, who had a poor game but was absolutely right in not whistling a late foul when Will Johnson went down in the final third, out wide of the penalty box. Kelly allowed no extra time for the delay and didn’t even wait for the cleanup before ordering Atlanta goalkeeper Alec Kann to restart play, blowing the whistle seconds later.
The club’s six-match winning streak came to an end, as well as the team’s string of six multi-goal games — both Orlando City MLS bests.
“Obviously an emotional, emotional affair tonight — passionate affair from the crowd to the staff, to the players. I think everybody put everything they had into this game,” Head Coach Jason Kreis said after the match. “It’s unfortunate, because the way we played the second half I think on a lot of different nights we walk out of here with a draw. But some things went against us, for sure. Some decisions went against us, and some of our thoughts in the first half surely went against us.”
Kreis went with the same lineup from the win last weekend over Real Salt Lake except Chris Schuler was replaced by Amro Tarek. Schuler was in the 18 and Donny Toia was left off the team sheet.
The game was only nine minutes old when an officiating decision gave the visitors a leg up. Greg Garza went down after contact with Higuita and Kelly deemed it a foul in the penalty area. Higuita did get his hands up on Garza, who went down far too easily. Martinez stepped up and took a cheeky spot kick that put Atlanta up, 1-0.
“I saw Cristian, and he did raise his hands,” Kreis said. “And I don’t know whether there was physical contact or not — let’s hope that there was some contact — but the player went down extremely softly and for me that kind of penalty kick should never be called in a game like this.”
Orlando responded with a long-range attempt by Yoshimar Yotún that went wide, a Mohamed El-Munir effort that was deflected by the defense to Kann, and won a couple of corners. The second of those saw the Lions shouting for handball, and it did look like Atlanta’s attempted clearance came off a defender’s hand during an attempted clearance. No call was given and it was not reviewed.
Atlanta then started making Orlando pay for a few sloppy moments. Jeff Larentowicz sent a training ground set piece wide in the 23rd minute. Eight minutes later, Atlanta doubled its lead after a midfield giveaway. Miguel Almiron sent a ball through to ignite a counter that Higuita failed to deal with and Barco sent it wide to Garza. The Atlanta fullback sent it back to the top of the box, and Barco finished the play off by knocking one in off the crossbar to make it 2-0 at the 31-minute mark.
The Lions got forward a few more times in the late stages of the first half. Dom Dwyer earned a free kick just outside the penalty area, but Kljestan sent the set piece off the wall and out for a corner. The best Orlando City chance came in the 44th minute off a nice buildup that saw Chris Mueller cross for Higuita, who headed the ball right at Kann at point-blank range.
The teams each had five shots, with Orlando getting two on frame to Atlanta’s three. The Lions held 51% of the possession and both teams completed 82% of their passes in what was an evenly played first 45 minutes, but Atlanta’s lightning-fast counter made the visitors the more dangerous side.
If Atlanta was more dangerous in the first half, it was Orlando’s turn after the break. Uri Rosell replaced Higuita to start the second half and it seemed to help calm things down for the Lions.
Dwyer earned a corner in the first minute of the second half, blasting a shot that deflected out. In the 52nd minute, Meram fired toward the near post, forcing a good diving save from Kann to keep it out. But five minutes later, Meram got his goal.
A long shot by Johnson knuckled in on frame and Kann could only fight it off with his fists. Meram beat Miles Robinson to the rebound, stepped around the Atlanta defender, and slotted it past Kann to pull the Lions back into the game in the 57th minute.
“It felt good to silence the haters,” Meram said of the goal. “Obviously I want to score and help the team but I want to win and that’s the main focus on this group. Maybe I should have scored two tonight and helped out. I think I had another chance as well.”
After Orlando’s goal, Atlanta had a brief spell where it tried to put the game away. Martinez nearly did so with a header that he sent wide in the 60th minute.
The Lions regrouped, with Josué Colmán coming on for Mueller in the 66th minute. Two minutes later, Orlando nearly found an equalizer. Dwyer fizzed a cross in for Meram but the defense did just enough to keep Orlando’s goal scorer from making good contact.
Colmán brought something extra to Orlando’s attack, getting down the right wing to send crosses into the box, playing quick passes with Rosell and Kljestan in the middle of the pitch, and earning a few corner kicks.
Meram was feeling his oats with a sneaky half-cross/half-shot that fooled Kann but missed the target in the 72nd minute. But the left wing was getting tired, and his turnover two minutes later allowed Almiron a good scoring chance. Atlanta’s No. 10 shot wide, however. Noted Lion killer Hector Villalba — a second-half sub for Barco — forced a good save from Bendik moments later.
Lamine Sané nearly got onto a corner kick cross in the 81st minute, arriving at the ball at the same time Kann did. Seconds later, Dom scorched a cross through the area that was just a smidge behind substitute Stefano Pinho, who had come on for Meram.
The emotions of the match began to boil over while Darlington Nagbe was down on the pitch and both Villalba and Yotún were booked. Yoshi will miss the Lions’ next match for yellow card accumulation. The emotions weren’t restricted to team vs. team, either. Kljestan and El-Munir barked at each other shortly thereafter and came together momentarily.
Perhaps the most egregious missed call of the evening took place in the 90th minute when Pinho was completely wrapped up and pulled down at the edge of the penalty area. It would have only been a free kick, but it was a definite foul and Kelly opted not to call anything.
Dwyer got his head on a corner in stoppage time but couldn’t get any power behind it and Kann collected it easily. That turned out to be the last opportunity for the Lions, who continued to throw bodies forward, but when Johnson went down to the right of the box and no call was made, the bottles and cups rained down onto the pitch and Kelly opted to call the match complete.
“We can’t be that. We can’t do that,” Kreis said. “We certainly want to be a very, very difficult place to play but we need to show the right amount of restraint at that moment to not be throwing things on the field. We just can’t do that.”
The Lions ended up with 55% of the possession and an 11-8 shots advantage (6-4 on target). Both teams passed well, with Orlando City completing 83% and Atlanta 80%. The fouls were pretty even, with Orlando called for 12 and Atlanta 10, but the disparity in what was called was evident, as Higuita’s obstruction of Garza affected the game just 10 minutes in and several such instances on the other end — not even in the area — went uncalled.
The club released a statement after the match regarding the fan behavior in stoppage time, stating: “Orlando City SC does not support or condone the actions taken by fans at Orlando City Stadium during Sunday’s match against Atlanta United. Fans are strictly prohibited from throwing debris or objects onto the field. The club is using available resources to identify offenders, who will be penalized for their behavior in accordance with Major League Soccer and Orlando City Stadium regulations.
Orlando City SC takes great pride in the passion of its supporters and how they make Orlando City Stadium the most difficult venue to play at in MLS, but the safety of fans, players, officials and staff members is our top priority.”
The Lions will try to bounce back Friday when they visit BMO Field to take on Toronto FC at 8 p.m.
Orlando City
Orlando City Can Build Valuable Momentum in April
The last two games of April present a good chance for the Lions to keep building momentum ahead of a challenging May.
Orlando City got back to winning ways last Saturday and started a mini-undefeated streak in the process, as the Lions have now gone three games on the bounce without tasting defeat. OCSC has two more games to play during the month of April, and the scheduling gods have given the men in purple a chance to keep building on the recent run of good form, as a tricky and packed May schedule looms on the horizon. The last two April fixtures won’t be easy by any stretch, but an opportunity has presented itself if the Lions can play well and take advantage of it.
First, let’s turn our attention to Saturday’s game against CF Montreal up in Canada. Montreal currently has a record of 3-3-1 which is good for 10 points and eighth place in the Eastern Conference. These two teams faced each other in the very first game of the season, and it ended as a 0-0 draw, thanks largely in part to some shaky finishing on Orlando’s part and a couple excellent Pedro Gallese saves. Since then, Montreal has defeated a struggling FC Dallas team, an Inter Miami team that has looked equal parts unbeatable and extremely vulnerable at the back, and an FC Cincinnati side that so far has struggled to replace the goals of Brandon Vazquez. In other words, the wins haven’t come over bad teams, (aside from maybe Dallas) but rather teams that have had flawed, uneven starts to the season.
To be fair, many of the same criticisms could be leveled at Orlando City’s record. OCSC’s wins have come against Austin FC and D.C. United — two teams with leaky defenses that have each had uneven starts to the season — and the Lions have suffered losses that have ranged from uninspiring against Atlanta, to abhorrent against Miami. Where the two teams differ is that Orlando started the year battling on two fronts and then had key players missing through a combination of injury and international call-ups afterward. The Lions now have a nearly clean bill of health and looked much more cohesive with Wilder Cartagena and Cesar Araujo partnered in midfield once more — a welcome sight after some of the struggles that were endured when one or both were missing at various times.
The Canadian side also hasn’t kept a clean sheet since that opening game of the season against the Lions, a fact that could bode well for an Orlando side which has scored six goals in its last three games. As long as the defense can tighten up and not make the sorts of mental errors that led to goals against D.C. and the New York Red Bulls, there will be opportunities at the other end of the field for an attacking corps that has done a better job at putting the ball in the net than we saw during the first game of the season. In short, the game is a winnable one, and while getting road results in MLS is never easy, OCSC should feel reasonably confident about its chances to get points on its trip north of the border.
That leaves Toronto FC’s visit to the Purple Palace on Saturday, April 27. The Reds currently sit one spot below CF Montreal, in ninth place, with a record of 3-4-1 and 10 points. TFC’s victories have been over a New England team that has been struggling mightily, a Charlotte FC side that has had a decent but slightly inconsistent start to the year, and an Atlanta United outfit that can have the same said of it as Charlotte. The wins have all been solid ones, and the team looked pretty good in those three games.
On the flip side of things, the last of those wins came on March 23, with Toronto dropping its last three games in a row and conceding 10 goals in the process. They’ve got the second leakiest defense of any of the nine teams in the playoff places, while being tied with Cincinnati for scoring the fewest goals.
Then there’s the issue of player availability. The Reds’ injury list is a long one, with six players currently listed as out and an additional one as questionable. Among those listed out are Lorenzo Insigne, Richie Laryea, Brandon Servania, and Shane O’Neill. In other words, they’re likely to be missing guys that are key contributors for the team when healthy, and part of the recent losing streak can be attributed to dealing with the injury bug that’s bit the team with a vengeance. Playing on the road without a number of important key players is rarely a recipe for success, and Orlando City should have another good chance to pick up three points.
Now, this isn’t to say that taking all six points from these games is a foregone conclusion. MLS is a tricky league to get results in, and we have no way of knowing how the fortunes of Orlando, Montreal, and Toronto will change in the next eight days. But given the leaky defenses of the two Canadian sides, TFC’s injury situation, and Orlando City seemingly starting to find a better patch of form, the Lions have an opportunity to keep picking up points and climbing the Eastern Conference standings. Vamos Orlando!
Lion Links
Lion Links: 4/19/24
Orlando Pride host the San Diego Wave, Orlando City B faces Crown Legacy FC, Europa League action, and more.
Happy Friday! Make sure to get your night plans in order as both the Orlando Pride and Orlando City B have games tonight. Figure out your drink of choice, charge those devices if you don’t plan on heading to the stadium for the Pride game, and knock out any chores before things get rolling. It should be a fun day, so let’s get it started with some links!
Orlando Pride Host the San Diego Wave Tonight
After earning their first win last week in Utah, the Orlando Pride are back in the City Beautiful for tonight’s game against the San Diego Wave at 8 p.m. The Pride’s four-game unbeaten run is on the line and will be put to the test against a Wave team that has four points from three games. San Diego has only scored two goals this season, but it has also secured a pair of clean sheets so far. The biggest storyline heading into the match is whether or not Barbra Banda will make her Pride debut. Hopefully Orlando can light it up at home and keep former Pride forward Alex Morgan and the rest of the Wave’s offense in check.
Orlando City B Takes On Crown Legacy FC
The Young Lions are also in action tonight at 7:30 p.m., with a match against Crown Legacy FC in North Carolina. Crown Legacy is only a point behind OCB, but is still searching for its first win of this MLS NEXT Pro season. OCB has played every game away from the Orlando area so far and ground out a 1-1 draw against Philadelphia Union II last weekend. Orlando hasn’t won a game since its season opener on March 16, but has been proven capable of getting points on the road. Wilfredo Rivera and Yutaro Tsukada linked up for the equalizer in that match, so hopefully they can keep that momentum rolling into tonight’s game.
Americans to Watch This Weekend
European soccer seasons and tournaments are nearing their ends and there are many Americans in important games this weekend. Haji Wright’s heroics put Coventry City into the FA Cup semifinals, and he will have a chance to impress again on Sunday against Manchester United. Elsewhere in England, Fulham duo Antonee Robinson and Tim Ream could put a dent in Liverpool’s title hopes, while Nottingham Forest’s Matt Turner and Giovanni Reyna will square off against Everton, as both sides aim to avoid relegation. Over in Italy, AC Milan duo Christian Pulisic and Yunus Musah will try to stop Inter Milan from claiming the Serie A title in a rivalry match at San Siro. There’s also a showdown between Americans in the Scottish Cup semifinals, with Celtic’s Cameron Carter-Vickers going up against Aberdeen and Dante Polvara.
Europa League Quarterfinals Come to a Close
The Europa League quarterfinals are done and dusted and only four teams remain in contention for some silverware. West Ham United took the lead against Bayer Leverkusen, but couldn’t overcome the aggregate deficit and the German club advanced. Leverkusen also scored a late equalizer to make it a 1-1 draw and extend its unbeaten streak to 44 games. Marseille scored at home against Benfica to send the game to extra time and then won the eventual penalty shootout. Atalanta did enough in a 1-0 loss to Liverpool to advance on aggregate, with Liverpool’s lone goal coming from an early Mohamed Salah penalty kick. AS Roma is also through to the semifinals after a 2-1 win against AC Milan, despite a red card in the first half. In the semifinals, Marseille will face Atalanta and Leverkusen will take on Roma.
Free Kicks
- Houston Dynamo Head Coach Ben Olsen has agreed to a new contract that will keep him with the club through 2026. Olsen has quietly dragged the Dynamo out of the Western Conference’s basement and won last year’s U.S. Open Cup as well.
- New York Red Bulls defender Andres Reyes was suspended an additional match for violent conduct in the team’s match against the Chicago Fire. This means Reyes will miss tomorrow’s match against LAFC and the home game against the Vancouver Whitecaps on April 27.
- American left back Jorge Villafana is hanging up his cleats. He won the MLS Cup with the Portland Timbers back in 2015 and the Concacaf Gold Cup with the U.S. in 2017.
- Replays won’t be a part of the FA Cup for the next six years. This will ease some of the schedule congestion for English Premier League teams, but it denies lower-division sides the chance at more revenue.
- The folks over at Stars and Stripes FC shined a spotlight on forward Jubilo Iwata, who currently leads Japan’s J1 League in scoring after eight games. It’s always cool to learn more about some of the lesser-known players in the U.S. player pool.
- An NFL game between the Philadelphia Eagles and Green Bay Packers will be played in Brazil at Corinthians Arena. However, there’s an unofficial rule at the stadium that green can’t be worn, as it is the color of Corinthians rival, so we’ll see if that’s adhered to come September.
- Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird’s production company will adapt Cleat Cute, a romance novel by Meryl Wilsner about love between teammates on a women’s soccer team. As someone who’s read it and loved it, I’m pretty excited for the show to say the least.
That’s all I have for you today. Stay hydrated and enjoy the games today. Go Orlando!
Orlando City
Orlando City at CF Montreal: Three Keys to Victory
What does Orlando City need to do on the road against CF Montreal to take home all three points ?
Orlando City opened the season against CF Montreal, playing to a 0-0 draw at Inter&Co Stadium back in February. Now, the Lions head to the Great White North to play the pesky Canadian club again. There’s no Concacaf Champions Cup competition to worry about this time, so hopefully Orlando City can get a victory.
What does Orlando City need to do to follow up the D.C. United victory with another win?
Just Say No
Outscoring your opponents while giving up two goals is all well and good, but outscoring your opponents while also keeping a clean sheet is much better. Orlando City has given up 13 goals over seven matches. It’s actually worse than that considering that the club has two clean sheets meaning those 13 goals came in just five matches. The Lions need to do better at not conceding goals.
Of course, one of those clean sheets came against Montreal to start the season, and the entire defense is seemingly healthy and ready to go. Our old foe Josef Martinez is always a threat and Matias Coccaro has three goals for Montreal so far this season. Stopping them is crucial. If Orlando City can maintain the same defensive discipline it showed in the previous match against Montreal, it will make earning points on the road much easier.
Designated Player Goals
Orlando City has scored seven goals so far this season. Duncan McGuire leads the team with three goals, thanks to his goal last week. Do you know who hasn’t scored yet? If you said any of Orlando City’s Designated Players, you would be correct. I’m not going to ring any emergency bells just yet, but it’d be a lot cooler if Luis Muriel, Martin Ojeda, or Facundo Torres scored a goal this week.
I think they are all close to breaking out. Torres has scored this year, just not in the MLS regular season. Muriel has been getting closer each match, and is still contributing in other ways. The same can be said of Ojeda. My point is that the goals are coming. Perhaps a trip to another country is exactly what they need to get off the mark.
The Battle on the Wings
Orlando City will be playing against former Lion Ruan. He lines up on the right for Montreal and will be a challenge for either Rafael Santos or Kyle Smith, depending on who gets the start. Of course, if Ivan Angulo is playing in his usual role on the left side of Orlando City’s attack, there could be some interesting races between the two speedy players.
I think that the other side of the field is where the match might be won or lost. Since Orlando City fell out of the Concacaf Champions Cup, the team has been on a more regular schedule. That has allowed Dagur Dan Thorhallsson to regain his form in the right fullback position for the Lions. He scored a goal last week, has an assist on the season, four crosses, and 10 key passes. He is an integral part of Orlando City’s attack and if he can win the battles against Raheem Edwards and Joaquin Sosa on the right side of Montreal’s lineup, he could have another big night.
That is what I will be looking for Saturday night. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below. Vamos Orlando!
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