PawedCast Episode 270: Crew/Nashville Rewinds, Pride-Chicago, Montreal Preview, and More

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Orlando City was far too lackadaisical in allowing preventable early goals in its 3-2 loss at the Columbus Crew in the midweek, which placed even more importance on Sunday’s match against Nashville SC. And then, well, that happened.

It won’t bring Orlando City fans much comfort to know their team did just enough to win that match on Sunday because the customary — and important! — points that come with wins will not be awarded. Referee Allen Chapman saw to that. While one can usually simply point to incompetence rather than malice (after all, this is a match official who did not understand the shootout rules in last year’s Orlando City vs. New York City FC playoff game), it’s difficult to see Chapman’s decision as mere ineptitude in this case because there is a standard to be met of “clear and obvious” required to overturn the call on the field that cannot reasonably be said to exist.

Dave Rohe and I break down the road loss and the home win that only netted one point due to Chapman’s Halloween Heist of the other two, and make our selections for Man of the Match for each game. We discuss where that leaves the Lions with one match left to play and how Chapman ruined a storybook contribution from Alexandre Pato.

We also discuss the Orlando Pride’s season-ending loss to the Chicago Red Stars on Friday. That 1-0 loss ends the once-promising 2021 Pride campaign on a five-game losing streak. We talk about where the club goes from here and some roster moves that have already taken place.

This week’s mailbag asked about Pedro Gallese, and, for some reason, referee accountability (can’t imagine why). If there’s anything — and we do mean anything — you want us to address on the next show, just ask by tweeting it to us at @TheManeLand with the hashtag #AskTMLPC.

We close the show with our key match-ups and score predictions for Orlando City at Montreal on Decision Day.

That’s all for this week.

Stay safe and enjoy the show!

Here’s how No. 270 went down:

0:15 – Columbus finally got a win in the series at perhaps the worst popular time after five straight losses to Orlando and way too much talk about the Halloween Heist (please congratulate me on keeping the podcast kid-friendly because it was an exercise in restraint on my part).

55:08 – The Pride have a lot to accomplish this off-season after finishing the year on a five-game skid, starting with a coaching search and ending with a retooling of the side.

1:11:05 – Our mailbag and predictions for Decision Day.