Orlando City
Orlando City vs. Inter Miami CF: Final Score 2-1 as Pereyra’s Goal Lifts Lions Past Herons
A goal by Brek Shea leveled the score in the second half but Mauricio Pereyra restored City’s advantage moments later.
For the third straight game, Orlando City scored first but conceded an equalizing goal. But unlike the previous two matches, the Lions responded and regained the lead immediately to beat Inter Miami 2-1 at Exploria Stadium. Orlando (5-2-4, 19 points) is unbeaten in its last five games (3-0-2), while Inter Miami (2-7-2, 8 points) had a modest three-game unbeaten streak snapped. The Lions improved to 2-1-0 against Miami.
Mauricio Pereyra scored his second goal of the season to break a 1-1 deadlock after a first-half Inter Miami own goal was canceled out by a second-half header by former Orlando City player Brek Shea. That was the difference as Miami conceded more than one goal for the first time since beating the Lions 3-2 in the first game of the MLS restart.
“Good game, especially again the first half for us was with a lot of quality,” Head Coach Oscar Pareja said after the game. “The players imposed on the game to create options. And when we came back from the first half we didn’t want to change, but I think (Miami coach) Diego (Alonso) moved his team very well. And then they started creating some challenges for us, especially on the sides because he extended his line. And then I think we had opportunies to react and we did. We scored a second goal.”
Despite having a normal week between games for a change, Pareja didn’t roll with a first-choice lineup. Kyle Smith and Rodrigo Schlegel slotted into the left side of the back line next to Antonio Carlos and Ruan in front of goalkeeper Pedro Gallese. Junior Urso and Sebas Mendez manned the central midfield behind attacking midfielders Nani, Pereyra, and Chris Mueller and striker Daryl Dike. Uri Rosell and Robin Jansson were left out of the 18 completely.
“[Rosell] had a pain that we want to take care of. It’s nothing important but we wanted him to recover from the exhausted weeks that he had had,” Pareja said. “And Robin, in the last day as well, he picked up a knock and couldn’t play. But as I say, when these things happen, it just opens opportunities for some players that are waiting.”
The first half was extremely contentious, with Miami players nipping at Orlando’s heels every time the Lions moved into the attacking third. Orlando players didn’t appreciate Ismail Elfath allowing so much contact, including a rough challenge on Nani that drew no card, but actually led to the opening goal.
But the most physical play was Miami-on-Miami crime. Leandro Gonzalez Pirez collided with Ben Sweat in the air, and the latter stayed down and had to leave the game in the opening minutes. Former Lion Mikey Ambrose replaced him.
Nani provided the first good opportunity of the match after Mueller drew a foul outside the area. The captain’s free kick beat the wall but smacked off the crossbar in the 11th minute.
Juan Agudelo got Miami’s first good chance off a corner with a free header but his shot was off target in the 28th minute.
Nicolas Figal had been nipping at Nani’s heels throughout the first half and the captain knocked a ball past him in the 33rd and attempted to run by him but the Miami defender reached out and hauled Nani down roughly, getting a lecture from Elfath but no booking. Pereyra took the ensuing free kick, which appeared to hit off of Schlegel then off of Miami defender Andres Reyes and into the net to make it 1-0 in the 34th minute.
Mendez stepped up into a good shooting area just outside the box in the 38th minute, but he didn’t make good contact and skipped a slow shot wide of goal. Four minutes later, Dike beat Reyes and was hauled down just outside the area to set up an Orlando free kick and earning Reyes a booking. This time Nani got his free kick on goal but Luis Robles made a diving save to keep it at 1-0 in the 43rd minute.
Reyes should have gotten his second yellow in the 45th minute, when he clobbered Pereyra in the head but no call was made and Miami countered, resulting in a yellow instead for Schlegel. That was it for the first half.
Orlando had more shots (5-3), more shots on target (1-0), and more corners (4-2) in the opening half, while keeping the ball for 67.9% of the time and out-passing Miami, 89%-77%.
Shea came on for Ambrose to start the second half and Ruan roasted him just after the restart. The Brazilian right back burned Shea down the right side but his pass intended for Pereyra at the top of the box was behind the Uruguayan.
The game opened up for a bit after that, with Gallese making a stop on Lewis Morgan in the 53rd and Mueller forcing a diving save from Robles in the 55th minute.
Miami got the equalizer from a familiar face in the 65th minute. Gallese punched out a corner kick cross but Rodolfo got onto the ball out on the right and sent a cross back into the box. His cross found Shea, who out-jumped Carlos near the penalty spot and headed inside the left post to make it 1-1.
The tie didn’t last long. Orlando came right back to regain the lead in the 69th minute. Nani tried to feed a through ball to Pereyra but it was deflected and found its way to Mueller, who hit it with his first touch and found Pereyra at the top of the 18. The Uruguayan fired off the left post and into the net to make it 2-1.
The celebration in the stadium was nearly a costly one. With purple smoke still hanging in the air near The Wall, Shea launched a high ball from midfield. Gallese had trouble locating the ball and it was almost right on top of him when he did. El Pulpo was able to knock it out for a corner but it was nearly a bizarre goal.
As strange as that was, the game got really weird a couple minutes later. A through ball came in for Julian Carranza with Schlegel trailing the play. Carranza went down but Elfath did not spot any infraction on the Orlando center back, who yelled at Carranza to get up, prompting some Miami teammates to come forward and get into Schlegel’s face. Miami lobbied for a penalty call and Elfath consulted with Video Assistant Referee Christina Unkel, then went to the monitor.
Elfath reviewed the play and awarded a penalty and a second yellow card to Schlegel, sending him off. However, Unkel continued to review the play and ruled that Carranza was offside before the foul was committed. The penalty was nullified, as well as the second yellow to Schlegel.
“I couldn’t see much from my view,” Pareja said about the play. He said the fourth official came over to tell him the play was ruled offside after the initial video review by Elfath.
The strange night continued in the 80th when a ball into the area pinballed between a few players and fell perfectly for Shea to run onto but his shot was blocked.
After that, Alex De John came on for his first appearance of the season and Orlando went to three at the back. From that point on, Miami’s only good look at goal was a bloop shot from Pizarro that was a comfortable catch for Gallese.
Miami turned the shots around, firing to a 12-8 final margin, but each team got three on target. Inter ended up with more corners (7-5), while Orlando held more possession (54.4%) and was still the better passing team despite a sloppy second half (83%-82%). While some may blame a bunkering mentality, it was really Orlando’s lack of sharpness playing out of the back in the second period, combined with Miami pushing more players forward that pushed both the possession and accuracy numbers.
“They have physical players in the back,” Pereyra said of the chippy match. “They have Reyes, Gonzalez Pirez and Figal. They are really tough and I think they make us troubles there.”
“That’s the nature of a rivalry match,” Mueller said. “There’s always a little bit of an extra edge to the game. You could see it as we’re coming together with the referee. There’s a lot of things after the play. That’s just the way it is in derby games, especially one like this that’s starting to build. I think it’s good though. It’s fun. It makes for a good match and a lot of intensity, a lot of energy between the two teams so, it’s great for for everybody.”
Orlando City has completed Phase 1 of the MLS restart and will begin Phase 2 next Saturday at home when the Chicago Fire visit Exploria Stadium at 7:30 p.m.
Orlando City
More Spice or Less? Tyrese Spicer as Starter vs. Substitute
Tyrese Spicer’s performances as an OCSC starter and substitute, and how he ranks as against offensive subs in MLS.
Back in 2015, I worked for a company that assigned me to a project for a company in Trinidad & Tobago, and I spent about half a year traveling back and forth from Orlando to Port of Spain, the capital city. I loved everything about my time in Trinidad & Tobago, and while I promise this will move to soccer shortly and not become a travelogue or a food blog, I have to briefly mention my discovery there of a food called “doubles.”
Doubles are often eaten as a breakfast food but are delicious at any time of the day. Much like with cheesesteaks in Philadelphia, there is a language associated with ordering them. A doubles order usually consists of how many you want and how hot you would like them to be. I do not have a high tolerance for heat, so I often ordered mine with “no pepper,” (tell me you are an American without telling me you are an American), but Trinis generally go with at least slight pepper and often medium or heavy pepper.
All of that discussion of Trinidad & Tobago and pepper brings us to a man who comes from the twin islands and literally has spice in his last name — Tyrese Spicer.
Spicy T was the Man of the Match in our player grades from Orlando City’s most recent MLS game after contributing a goal and an assist. He scored his fourth goal of the MLS season, which ranks second on the team behind Martín Ojeda’s 11. Spicer scored that goal after coming off the bench to replace Tiago, and his bench goal was the seventh for the Lions this season, which ties them for the league lead in goals scored by substitutes:
| Team | Substitute Goals | Total Goals* | Substitute Goal % |
|---|---|---|---|
| Orlando City | 7 | 30 | 23% |
| Cincinnati | 7 | 44 | 16% |
| Seattle | 6 | 20 | 30% |
| Miami | 6 | 44 | 14% |
| Portland | 5 | 32 | 16% |
| Dallas | 5 | 31 | 16% |
| St. Louis | 5 | 23 | 22% |
| Nashville | 5 | 35 | 14% |
*Excludes opposition own goals
All four of Spicer’s goals in MLS play have come as a substitute, and he is tied for the league lead with Cincinnati’s Tom Barlow in that category:
| Player | Team | Substitute Goals |
|---|---|---|
| Tyrese Spicer | Orlando City | 4 |
| Tom Barlow | Cincinnati | 4 |
| Christian Ramirez | Austin | 3 |
| Samuel Sarver | Dallas | 3 |
| Peyton Miller | New England | 3 |
During the entire 2025 MLS season the league leaders in substitute goals scored only four goals off the bench, and Spicer has already reached that tally through Orlando City’s first 18 league games.
Extrapolating those 18 games to the full season would put Spicer on pace for 7.56 goals, and since he has scored all of his goals off the bench, the extrapolation for goals as a substitute would also be for that same amount, which would be the most in MLS since Dejan Joveljić scored eight goals as a substitute for the LA Galaxy in 2022.
A logical question would be: If Spicer is scoring all these goals in limited minutes as a substitute, should Orlando City just make him a starter?
On the surface, it seems like an obvious no.
Put aside the fact that leading scorer Martín Ojeda is out injured but will command a starting spot when he returns, likely at the same left wing position where Spicer usually plays, another fact is that since joining Orlando City in August of 2025, Spicer has played demonstrably better off the bench than as a starter across all competitions (data from Opta’s tracking on fbref.com):
| Role | Minutes Played | Goals | Primary Assists | Goal Contributions per 90 mins |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | 457 | 2 | 0 | 0.39 |
| Subtitute | 557 | 5 | 4 | 1.45 |
In recent years, Orlando City has benefitted from “supersubs,” as Spicer’s four goals thus far in 2026 marks the fourth consecutive season in which a Lion has scored at least four goals in a season as a substitute. Duncan McGuire started the trend with five in 2023 and added four in 2024. Ramiro Enrique followed with four off the bench in 2025 (and likely would have scored more that had he not transferred in August; I really wish he had stayed. Sigh.), and now Spicer has four in 2026 with many games still to play. McGuire’s five in 2023 is the joint club record with Júlio Baptista, as The Beast lived up to that moniker when coming off the bench in 2016, but Spicer is hot on their heels.
Some players simply perform better off the bench, and Spicer, at least so far, seems to be in that Manu Ginóbili mold of a player with starter-level talent that is better at finishing games than starting them.
Orlando City General Manager and Sporting Director Ricardo Moreira noted this when the club acquired Spicer from Toronto, saying that the Trinidad & Tobago international player would “bring additional depth and energy” and that “his relentless work rate and ability to stretch the field will give us a much-needed boost and add another dimension to our attack moving forward.”
Spicer’s boosts off the bench have led to two game-winning goals this season, the fourth in the amazing 4-3 comeback victory over Inter Miami in May and the only goal in the 1-0 home victory over Nashville at the end of July.
August is a packed month for Orlando City, with at least eight games on the calendar and possibly nine, depending on how the Lions do in Leagues Cup. We’ll see throughout the rest of August (this article was written before the Leagues Cup game against CF Monterrey, which had Spicer in the starting lineup) if Martín Perelman is locked in to using Spicer as a supersub or gives him additional chances as a starter, as there will need to be some rotation with games every three to four days.
The numbers say that Perelman should keep looking for someone to hold down the left wing for the first portion of the game and bring in Spicer to close, but Orlando City’s poor play on the left side of the field in the first half helped dig a hole it could not climb out of against the Red Bulls, and this is a critical part of the season, so getting positive results is of paramount importance.
I’m looking forward to finding out if Perelman makes the call to go from no pepper to Spicy T as a frequent left wing starter, at least until Ojeda returns. The numbers are against it, as am I, but we shall see what Perelman orders.
Vamos Orlando!
Orlando City
Pasalic Remains in Purple
Marco Pasalic is staying. What does that mean for Orlando City’s season?
At least for the moment, it seems the Marco Pasalic to Hull City transfer is a bust. With the Croatian back in the mix for Orlando City, the team will have two of three Designated Players available. Unfortunately, we’re still waiting for Martin Ojeda to make it back from his injury. In the meantime, the return of the left-footed, Croatian rocket launcher is a good thing, right? Let’s take a look at the arguments for and against, and how it affects the rest of the squad.
More Firepower
Pasalic has the potential to contribute a significant number of goals for Orlando City. We haven’t seen what he can do when on the pitch with Antoine Griezmann, who can create space for Pasalic on the right side of the box. Griezmann can drag defenders to the left, allowing Pasalic more of an opening to unleash his signature top-of-the-box shot. Griezmann or Justin Ellis will be able to provide slick, no-look passes to a hopefully wide-open Pasalic.
Additionally, if Pasalic regains his form, the threat he poses will allow the left side of the attack some more space to move. There’s also the Daryl Dike factor. Once the big man is fully integrated back into the attack, there is a veritable smorgasbord of attacking options for an attack-oriented Martin Perelman to employ. He does seem to have an “all gas, no brakes, who needs defense” approach to tactics. Obviously, that is hyperbole, but not by much.
All of this is contingent on Pasalic resetting his mindset to give 100% to Orlando City. As a professional, I expect he will believe he is going to do so, but that doesn’t mean it’s easy, given he obviously wanted to make a move back to Europe. Recommitting to a team you thought you were leaving is never easy, no matter what anyone says.
Defensive Implications
If Orlando City had sold Pasalic, there would have been an infusion of cash available to help build the roster. I think it unlikely that a new Designated Player could be signed before the secondary window closes. That kind of money could be used on a decent left back, another veteran center back, or help in the defensive midfield. Maybe even all of the above.
Now, the money is tied up and the defense still has so many challenges. I don’t think Pasalic’s offensive production will be able to overcome the goals the defense will give up the rest of the season. Not losing a Designated Player at this point of the season is generally a good thing, especially with Ojeda being injured, though I’m not convinced things are actually better with Pasalic staying. Of course, even if he had been sold, there’s no guarantee that Ricardo Moreira would reinforce the defense in the transfer window.
I’m hopeful that Pasalic rededicates himself to Orlando City and starts to produce some goals for the Lions, because given this defense, the team will need as many goals as possible. Let us know your thoughts on how Pasalic staying plays out. Vamos Orlando!
Lion Links
Lion Links: 8/6/26
Orlando City beats Monterrey, Marco Pasalic reportedly staying in Orlando, Zambia ousted from Women’s Africa Cup of Nations, and more.
It’s Thursday, which means we’re celebrating an Orlando City victory. The Lions have been midweek monsters this season and it’s been a nice boost of energy to get through the week. If any of you are performing some sort of ritual on Wednesday nights, please keep it up. Let’s get to the big win and more in today’s links!
Orlando City Beats Monterrey in Leagues Cup
After a lengthy weather delay, Orlando City beat Monterrey 2-1 at home in its first match of this year’s Leagues Cup. The video review system was put through its paces in this match, overturning a Monterrey goal, a Monterrey red card, and a penalty on Orlando’s Robin Jansson in separate instances. Be sure to check out our recap of the win, which included a nice performance from Tyrese Spicer as a starter and the return of Daryl Dike off the bench. The Lions will be back in action on Saturday against Club Leon before wrapping up this phase of the tournament on Wednesday against San Luis.
Marco Pasalic Reportedly Staying in Orlando
There’s been buzz this summer regarding Marco Pasalic being transferred form Orlando City to Hull City, but the move is reportedly not going to happen according to Croatian sports newspaper Sportske Novosti.
Pasalic had 12 goals and five assists in his first MLS season last year after joining Orlando from HNK Rijeka. While the 25-year-old hasn’t quite had the same impact so far this season, he did play for Croatia in this summer’s World Cup and could benefit from the addition of Antoine Griezmann to the offense. Pasalic came off the bench for a late cameo on Wednesday to help see out the win over Monterrey.
Zambia Eliminated From WAFCON Despite Win
Orlando Pride forward Barbra Banda scored in Zambia’s 2-1 win against Malawi in the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations, but it wasn’t enough for Zambia to avoid elimination. Zambia, Malawi, and Nigeria all finished with six points in the group stage, but Zambia was ousted due to the third tiebreaker of goals scored in matches between the three. It’s a rough way to go out for Zambia, which finished with the best overall goal differential in the group. As a result, Zambia will not take part in the 2027 Women’s World Cup. Banda finished the tournament with five goals and will return to a Pride team in desperate need of help on offense.
U.S. Qualifies for 2027 U-20 Men’s World Cup
The United States U-19 Men’s National Team beat Guatemala 3-1 to advance to the semifinals of the Concacaf U-20 Men’s Championship, qualifying for the 2027 U-20 World Cup and 2027 Pan American Games in the process. Guatemala struck first, but the U.S. found an equalizer right before halftime and went on to win the game with a pair of goals in the second half. Orlando City midfielder Colin Guske was a starter in the match as well. The U.S. will take on Costa Rica in the semifinals Friday at the Azteca.
FIFA Backs Gianni Infantino as Pressure Rises
As the soccer world reacts to FIFA President Gianni Infantino’s failed scheme to sell stakes in the World Cup, FIFA reaffirmed its support for him at a crisis meeting in Morocco over his presidency. There have been many calls for reform due to Infantino’s actions, with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney stating he does not have confidence in him and Portuguese legend Luis Figo calling for him to step down. FIFA also denied a report that Infantino offered Morocco hosting for the 2030 World Cup final in exchange for support.
Free Kicks
- Former Lion Nico Lodeiro announced his retirement from professional soccer and Orlando City General Manager and Sporting Director Ricardo Moreira wished him the best with one of his highlights as a Lion.
- The Columbus Crew added Chilean forward Gonzalo Tapia on loan from Sao Paulo through the 2027 MLS sprint season.
- Eva Olid was announced as the next head coach of Manchester United’s women’s soccer team, replacing former Pride head coach Marc Skinner. She has spent the past five years with Hearts and won the Scottish Women’s Premier League title last season.
- Wrexham signed midfielder Ben Whiteman, who has 200 EFL Championship appearances under his belt and was Preston North End’s captain.
- Mo Salah arrived in Istanbul as it appears he will sign with Trabzonspor after nine seasons with Liverpool. Does this make the Turkish Super Lig a retirement league or does that label only apply when it’s about MLS?
That’s all I have for you this time around. I hope you all have a wonderful Thursday and rest of your week!
More Spice or Less? Tyrese Spicer as Starter vs. Substitute
Pasalic Remains in Purple
Lion Links: 8/6/26
Orlando City vs. Monterrey, Leagues Cup: Preview, How to Watch, TV Info, Live Stream, Lineups, Match Thread, and More
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