Orlando City
Orlando City vs. New York City FC: Player Grades and Man of the Match
Orlando City hosted New York City FC at Exploria Stadium after having the previous match against the Columbus Crew postponed. Óscar Pareja was finally able to send out the speedy Ruan, which was important with Pedro Gallese and Sebas Méndez still away on international duty. Unfortunately, João Moutinho, Uri Rosell, Mauricio Pereyra, Tesho Akindele, and Dom Dwyer are all still out with injuries and both Kyle Smith and Benji Michel joined the parade of unavailable players, so we saw a mixed unit of normal starters and newer guys. Let’s see how they did.
Starters
GK, Brian Rowe, 7.5 (MOTM) — Rowe had one of his best matches as a Lion on Wednesday night. He made seven saves in the match, including three difficult saves in the 26th, 64th, and 83rd minutes. He initially stopped Keaton Park’s scoring attempt in the 43rd minute, but it squirted past him and Park got to it first to level the score. Rowe attempted 20 passes at a 70% passing rate, and completed six of 12 long balls attempted. His distribution was solid, but it was his shot stopping that helped earn the point for Orlando City.
D, Kamal Miller, 5.5 — Like the rest of Orlando City’s defense, Miller had a strong showing. He made several good defensive tackles, including one that made up for a giveaway in the 71st minute on a bad pass to Nani. After giving that ball away, he tracked back, caught up, and dispossessed NYCFC in Orlando’s area. Defensively, Miller had one tackle, three clearances, five interceptions, and committed two fouls, earning a yellow card. He attempted 47 passes and had an 83% passing rate, and connected on four of eight long balls attempted. He had one shot that went wide left in the 62nd minute.
D, Robin Jansson, 6 — As usual, Jansson seemed to be wherever he was needed in leading the defense. He even came out of nowhere to make an interception in the opposing half. Defensively, Jansson made one tackle, one interception, three clearances, one blocked shot, and committed two fouls, earning a yellow card. Jansson attempted 43 passes at an 86.1% passing rate, and completed three of five long balls attempted. The Lions tried the Nani/Jansson “who’s going to take the free kick” thing again, and though it gave Jansson a shot attempt on the score sheet, it once again didn’t work.
D, Antonio Carlos, 6 — Carlos continued to show why he is a first choice starter on a club with several good defensive players. He made numerous key solo defensive plays to keep NYCFC off the scoreboard. Defensively, he made one tackle, eight interceptions, two clearances, and suffered one foul. Carlos attempted 54 passes with a 77.8% passing rate, and completed four of his 10 attempted long balls. However, it was his turnover that led to NYCFC’s goal.
D, Ruan, 6 — Ruan made his return after several weeks on the injured list. He played all the way into the 92nd minute before being subbed off. Often a player that has not seen the field in a while has trouble getting back up to speed. That isn’t the case with the fleet feet of Ruan. He was seemingly as fast as usual, leaving defenders in his wake. He did his usual job roaming up and down the right side to contribute on both ends. In addition to taking one shot, he provided the very pretty assist on Mueller’s goal, and earned a corner in the 20th minute. Defensively he made two tackles, three clearances, had one blocked shot, and one interception, and committed no fouls. Ruan attempted 26 passes, had an 80.8% passing rate, with two key passes, and completed one long ball. He did pass up a good opportunity to shoot late in the game.
MF, Joey DeZart, 5.5 — With plenty of the usual starters out, DeZart got his second start for the Lions, He took no shots on his 43 touches. He didn’t make many mistakes and looked a little nervy at times in the midfield — not that he’s gotten many minutes. He attempted 37 passes with a 91.9% passing rate, and completed one long ball. Defensively he had one clearance, and suffered one foul.
MF, Junior Urso, 5.5 — Urso put in a decent if a bit quiet shift. He attempted 30 passes with an 83.3% passing rate, and attempted one long ball. On defense he made one tackle, one interception, suffered one foul, and committed one foul. He did give NYCFC something to think about in the middle of the field, and that doesn’t always show up in the box score.
MF, Chris Mueller, 7 — The rest allowed by the postponed match against the Crew might have helped Mueller as much as anyone. In the early part of the game he was the Energizer bunny energy we’ve come to expect, but he didn’t have as much of the sloppiness he’s shown recently. Though he wasn’t able to connect on a diving header on an early Nani cross, he did score in the 18th minute on a header from Ruan’s excellent assist. Mueller was credited with two shots, with one on target for a goal. He committed one foul, and suffered two. Mueller attempted 31 passes with a 74.2% passing rate, and completed one of two long balls attempted.
MF,Andrés Perea, 6 — Perea started the match out very hot, missing just left on his only shot on goal in the second minute. That shot followed after he took the ball off a NYCFC player, made a nice give and go with Nani, and found himself in front of goal. Like the rest of Orlando City, Perea looked very good in the first half. He made three tackles, one clearance, and had one blocked shot. He attempted 33 passes, had a 97% passing rate, made one key pass, and connected on both of his long ball attempts.
MF, Nani, 6.5 — The captain looked like a man determined to put the team on his shoulders and win the thing all by himself at times. I’m not sure if he wasn’t feeling very trusting of some of his teammates, or if he just wanted the ball himself, but he had mixed results. Nani made some ridiculous moves on the NYCFC defense, making them look silly, but he also gave the ball up quite a bit. Still, he earned six fouls and only committed one. He had two shots, with one on target, and four crosses. He attempted 34 passes but with only a 58.8% passing rate, while creating three key passes and completing two of his five long ball attempts. Defensively he chipped in two tackles and an interception. Nani created havoc in his attack on NYCFC, but at times he also created issues for his own team in this game.
F, Daryl Dike, 5.5 — It’s not easy being the only available striker, and as such Dike was also a player that benefitted from the postponed match against the Crew. Dike only had one shot, a missed header in the 14th minute after a great team buildup to put the ball in the six-yard box. Generally, the big man was effective in occupying space, holding up play, and making good turns once he had the ball. However it wasn’t his best match either, as he was caught offside three times. Statistically, he suffered four fouls while committing none and made two tackles. Dike attempted 11 passes with a 63.3% passing rate.
Substitutes
MF, David Loera (76’), 5— Loera was brought on for DeZart to provide some energy and relieve some tired legs. Unfortunately, he was only able to get three touches. He completed his only pass attempt and drew a foul but it was a quiet appearance for the final 14 minutes plus 10 minutes of stoppage time.
MF, Robinho (84’), N/A — Robinho subbed in for Mueller, but only had four touches and one pass, which didn’t connect, and came on a bit too late to earn a grade.
MF, Jordan Bender (93’), N/A — Bender made his MLS debut in stoppage time. It was a bit of a time-wasting move as he relieved Dike. He committed a foul as his first action in MLS. That is all. He didn’t even register a touch of the ball.
D, Alex De John, (93’), N/A — De John came on late for Ruan, and only had three touches, and one (incomplete) pass.
That was how I saw it. Vote for your Man of the Match in the poll, and comment below.
Polling Closed
| Player | Votes |
| Brian Rowe | 53 |
| Antônio Carlos | 0 |
| Chris Mueller | 0 |
| Nani | 2 |
| Ruan | 2 |
| Other (write in comments) | 0 |
Lion Links
Lion Links: 11/22/24
Emily Sams wins Defender of the Year, Orlando City’s turnaround, Barbra Banda nominated for African Woman Player of the Year, and more.
Happy Friday! Beyond working and catching some soccer here and there, I don’t have many plans for the weekend. I’m also hoping to find some time to trial some cranberry and brie bites I’m trying to perfect before Thanksgiving next week. For now though, let’s jump right into today’s links from around the soccer world!
Emily Sams Awarded NWSL Defender of the Year
The Orlando Pride’s Emily Sams was named 2024 NWSL Defender of the Year after a fantastic season. The Pride only conceded 20 goals in a record-breaking season, and Sams played in all 13 of the team’s shutouts. Sams was one of the most impactful players for the Pride this year and had 163 recoveries, 76 clearances, and 16 blocks. She’s the first Pride player to win the award and it’s great to see her receive some deserved recognition in her second year in Orlando.
Analyzing Orlando City’s Revitalization
It’s been a rollercoaster of a season for the Lions to say the least. There were serious concerns over whether or not the Lions would even make the playoffs back in June and now they find themselves as the highest remaining seed in the Eastern Conference this postseason. Facundo Torres’ excellent run of play is a major reason behind the club’s turnaround, but the buy-in from all of Orlando’s attackers has helped create a dynamic and unselfish offense. Although expectations are rising once more for the Lions, Executive Vice President of Soccer Operations and General Manager Luiz Muzzi spoke on how the team is focused on Sunday’s playoff match.
“There’s only one team that matters: Atlanta United,” Muzzi said. “The easiest way to lose a game is to look ahead. I’ll say we didn’t expect to be playing at home, but it’s welcomed. We’re focused on Atlanta, they’re playing great. They have a lot of confidence and momentum. It doesn’t matter they’re the No. 9 seed because they’re not playing like the No. 9 seed.”
Barbra Banda Up For African Woman Player of the Year
Orlando Pride forward Barbra Banda was one of 10 players nominated for this year’s African Woman Player of the Year award. The 24-year-old has done well for both club and country this year. She scored 13 goals in her first regular season with the Pride and has three goals so far in the playoffs. Banda also had a hat trick for Zambia in the Summer Olympics. She’s joined by fellow NWSL players Temwa Chawinga and Racheal Kundananji on the list of nominees. Bay FC striker Asisat Oshoala, who has won the award in five of the past six years, was not nominated for the first time in a decade. The nomination list will be trimmed to a three-player shortlist before the winner is announced on Dec. 16 in Morocco.
Croix Bethune Named NWSL Midfielder of the Year
Washington Spirit rookie Croix Bethune won NWSL Midfielder of the Year after recording 10 assists and five goals in 17 matches this season. A knee injury cut her season short in September, but she still tied Tobin Heath’s record for the most assists in a season. Bethune gave plenty of NWSL teams headaches this year and also won Rookie of the Year earlier this week. She’s the first player to ever receive NWSL Midfielder of the Year and she beat out the Pride’s Marta, the North Carolina Courage’s Ashley Sanchez, and Kansas City Current duo Lo’eau LaBonta and Vanessa DiBernardo.
Eastern Conference Clubs Making Moves
FC Cincinnati officially signed striker Kevin Denkey from Cercle Brugge on a deal that will last through 2028. The 23-year-old joins as a Designated Player on a reported $16.2 million transfer, which would be a league record. He won the Golden Boot in Belgium last year after scoring 27 goals and should give Cincinnati some considerable firepower next year.
Elsewhere in the league, CF Montreal declined the option on Josef Martinez’s contract, meaning the Venezuelan forward will be a free agent once again. The 31-year-old led Montreal with 11 goals this season and we’ll see where he winds up next. Charlotte FC did not trigger the purchase option on Pep Biel’s loan, opening up a Designated Player spot. Former Lion Junior Urso’s contract option was also declined by Charlotte. The Philadelphia Union signed defender Olivier Mbaizo to a contract extension that will keep him with the club through 2026, with options for 2027 and 2028 as well.
Free Kicks
- In preparation for the 2026 World Cup, FIFA named 26 new options across the country as “base camps” for participating teams to train and rest. Orlando was included, with OCSC’s training grounds at Osceola Heritage Park pitched alongside the Lake Nona Wave Hotel.
- ESPN‘s Jeff Kassouf dove into how the NWSL stacks up to the biggest sports leagues in the U.S. Saturday’s NWSL Championship between the Pride and Spirit should showcase just how entertaining the league is to plenty of viewers.
- Pep Guardiola will stick around as Manchester City’s manager for a couple more years after signing a two-year contract extension with the club. His contract was set to expire at the end of this season.
- Here’s a cool breakdown of the seven amateur teams that have qualified for the 2025 Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup so far. None are from Florida, but there are some great logos to check out if you’re looking for a team to root for in the early rounds next year. Debutants Southern Indiana FC and the Virginia Dream are my personal favorites of the bunch.
- The draw for the 2025 Women’s Africa Cup of Nations will take place today. Zambia is in the second pot, meaning it will be put in a group of four that will include one of Nigeria, South Africa, or Morocco. The tournament itself will be in July of next year.
- Arsenal, Bayern Munich, and Manchester City all clinched a spot in the Women’s Champions League quarterfinals with two games still left to play.
That’s all I have for you this time around. I hope you all have a fantastic Friday and rest of your weekend. Go Orlando!
Orlando City
How Orlando City’s Offense Stacks Up Against What Atlanta Does Defensively
How Orlando City has performed against teams playing with three or four defenders, and how that may influence the playoff game against Atlanta United.
The most famous quote about real estate is that “there are three things that matter in property: location, location, location.” Soccer coaches also like to think in threes, especially when it comes to points, but for a soccer coach, the three things that matter might be the rhyming triplet “formation, formation, formation,” as that is where they will have the biggest influence on every game that their team plays.
Throughout his tenure as head coach, Óscar Pareja has preferred to use a 4-2-3-1 as his formation (fbref.com’s lineup data shows that the Lions primarily played a 4-2-3-1 in 65% of their MLS matches this season, and 79% of their MLS matches during the last three seasons). The Lions have lined up in a 4-2-3-1 during each of their last 14 games, and my confidence level is strong to quite strong (can you believe Meet the Parents came out 24 years ago?) that they will do so once again on Sunday when they host Atlanta United.
Atlanta United also prefers to deploy a 4-2-3-1, but was less consistent than Orlando City this season during MLS play, as evidenced by the chart below that shows how Atlanta lined up this season:
I am relying on the coders at Opta for their evaluation of the formation, as I do not watch a lot of Atlanta United matches (sounds terrible), but though Atlanta primarily played with four defenders in more than two-thirds of its matches, during the last two matches it played a 3-5-2, the only two matches all season in which interim coach Rob Valentino rolled out that formation. I suspect that the formation change was related partially to playing Inter Miami and trying to defend the Herons’ dynamic offense and partially due to an injury suffered by defender Brooks Lennon in the first game of that series. So, while Atlanta primarily played four in the back for most of the season, there is a good chance it will roll with what worked against Florida’s second-best MLS team when it plays Florida’s best MLS team this weekend.
Now, if you want to read more about Atlanta, then you can read our match preview, which will drop Sunday morning, but I want to look at how Orlando did against teams that play similar styles. Looking only at MLS games, the table below shows how Orlando City performed against different back line structures this season (the left side is how the Lions’ opponents lined up, the right side is how Orlando City performed against opponents in those formations):
Orlando City earned slightly more points per game — the stat that matters most — against teams that played four in the back, but the Lions had a better average goal differential when teams played three in the back. Atlanta will likely deploy one of those two formations. In both games against Orlando City this season, Sunday’s visitors went with a 4-2-3-1, but as mentioned earlier, they used three in the back in each of their last two matches, so it really could be either.
Soccer is not like baseball, where players primarily stay in the same spot throughout the game, so some of these stats have to be taken with a grain of salt, as players are not always rigidly in the same position throughout a match. A team may also primarily play with four in the back but switch to three when chasing a game, or five when trying to protect against a late goal.
That said, using the data around Orlando City’s opponents’ general formations, here are the attacking groups who played the most frequently against four defenders during the 24 MLS games where Opta coded the opponents as using a defensive group of four:
It is a little ominous that the main starting group, shown in row one, has played 666 MLS minutes against back lines of four this season, but do I like that green goal differential of +8 in those minutes, which is a strong +1.08 per 90 minutes. I like that goal differential more than I like all the things that Cardi B, Bad Bunny, and J Balvin like on their song that is creatively named “I Like It.” Coincidentally, when people ask me what I think about that song, I say, “I like it.” I am very creative.
If we look at the lineups that Orlando City has used against back lines of three defenders then there are some pretty major differences in personnel groupings, but it must be noted that more than half of the games against teams playing three in the back came early in the season, when Ramiro Enrique was unavailable to play. Enrique, my presumed starter at striker, has played fewer than three games’ worth of minutes (265 total) against back lines of three this season, and only 28 minutes with the main starting group, which ranks 13th among all the attacking lineups for minutes played against three defenders. That group scored one goal in their 28 minutes together though, for a robust 3.21 goals-scored-per-90-minutes average.
While the team as a whole has been successful against three-man back lines, I do not expect any of the lineups shown in the table below to play more than a few minutes together this weekend, though the first row and the last row are strong groups and had a lot of success.
I am sure that all week long the Orlando City coaching staff has been going back and forth on whether it is more likely that Atlanta reverts to its most commonly used four in the back, or if the Five Stripes try for three wins in a row with three in the back. I would prefer that Atlanta plays with zero defenders and goalkeeper Brad Guzan wears a blindfold, but I think that is unlikely to be the case.
Even though Atlanta defeated Orlando City both times while in a 4-2-3-1, based on available personnel and recent results, I believe that the team will come out in a 3-5-2 in Inter&Co Stadium in the conference semifinal. Good things come in threes, and Orlando City’s best offensive production this season has been against three defenders, so I am going to be hoping that this continues, and in the third game against Atlanta the Lions grab the three points. Three’s company!
Well, it is a playoff game, so there are no actual points at stake, but you know what I meant.
Vamos Orlando!
Orlando City
Orlando City vs. Atlanta United: Three Keys to Victory
What do the Lions need to do to get a victory to advance to the Eastern Conference final?
Orlando City continues its playoff journey against Atlanta United Sunday at Inter&Co Stadium. The Lions are coming off an emotional penalty shootout win over Charlotte FC in their best-of-three, first-round series. Likewise, Atlanta United stunned everyone by taking out Inter Miami to advance in its own best-of-three matchup. Now, the rivals meet in the Eastern Conference semifinals.
What does Orlando City need to do to get past Atlanta United to advance to the Easter Conference final?
Beat Guzan
Brad Guzan made 16 saves over Atlanta’s three matches against Inter Miami, including seven in the 3-2 win on the road in Game 3. The 40-year-old former USMNT keeper is in excellent form and is a big reason why the Five Stripes are facing Orlando City. Converting chances against Guzan will be crucial to earning a result. There have been times this season when the Lions have struggled to convert their chances. Despite that, the team has done enough offensively to get to this point. Facundo Torres, Martin Ojeda, Duncan McGuire, Ramiro Enrique, and others have contributed and will need to do so this weekend.
Cartagena is Essential
Orlando City lost twice to Atlanta United during the regular season. What is interesting, and perhaps relevant, is that Wilder Cartagena was out for both of those matches. Cartagena was shown a straight red in the match against Minnesota United prior to the first match against Atlanta way back in March. He was shown a yellow card in the match against FC Cincinnati and then served a yellow card accumulation suspension for the final match of the season against Atlanta. Fortunately for Orlando City, Cartagena will be available for the match this weekend. I’ve mentioned before the importance of Cartagena to Orlando City’s success. When he and Cesar Araujo are on the field together, the defense is simply better. Cartagena is frankly one of the better defensive midfielders in MLS. Atlanta scored five goals in the series against Miami, and Orlando will need to keep the visitors from having that kind of offensive success.
Overcome the Past
That darn international break in the middle of the playoffs is something I don’t love. More precisely, I don’t like it because Orlando City often struggles after a break. It would have been nice if Orlando City could have ridden the momentum from the penalty kick victory into the Atlanta match, but that’s not to be. Now is the time for Orlando City to break some bad habits, including turning around its historical lack of success against Atlanta, and tendency to struggle in the first match after a break. Oscar Pareja needs to have the players in the right frame of mind, and the players need to execute the plan. A full house of supporters can also make a difference. Given it’s a Sunday afternoon match, there’s no reason not to pack the house.
That is what I will be looking for Sunday afternoon. Let me know your thoughts in the comments below. Vamos Orlando!
Lion Links: 11/22/24
Orlando Pride Center Back Emily Sams Named 2024 NWSL Defender of the Year
How Orlando City’s Offense Stacks Up Against What Atlanta Does Defensively
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