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Orlando City vs. New York Red Bulls: Final Score 1-1 as a Late Own Goal Salvages a Point for the Lions

It was a mostly forgettable match but the Lions found a late goal to at least earn a point.

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8 months ago

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Dan MacDonald, The Mane Land

Orlando City continues to struggle in the final third, but an own goal created by a Jack Lynn flick allowed the Lions (1-3-2, 5 points) to come from behind late to grab a point in a 1-1 draw against the New York Red Bulls (3-1-2, 11 points). The Lions conceded first from the penalty spot with Lewis Morgan giving the visitors the lead, but ultimately found a way to get a result in front of an announced crowd of 23,859 at Inter&Co Stadium.

“A great effort with what a poor result,” Orlando City Head Coach Oscar Pareja said after the game. ” And the poor result means, we’ve got to take the point, but with that performance, that effort, that energy, you may think things should end different, but it did not. We conceded a PK from nothing and other than that dangerous play that New York had in the second half, I don’t remember any other action (created by the Red Bulls).”

Pareja’s lineup included Pedro Gallese back in goal after missing last weekend while on international duty. El Pulpo lined up behind a back line of Rafael Santos, Robin Jansson, Rodrigo Schlegel, and Dagur Dan Thorhallsson. The four-man midfield was made up of Ivan Angulo, Nico Lodeiro, Kyle Smith, and Facundo Torres. Luis Muriel and Duncan McGuire led the attack up top.

The Lions started on the front foot but struggled to break through New York’s tight defense in the last decisive movement. Angulo fired a shot that was blocked behind for a corner in the second minute. Orlando took its first several corners short in the first half and none of those plays came close to producing anything.

Thorhallsson tried to fizz a cross through the six to Angulo in the fifth minute but it was too close to Carlos Coronel, who came off his line to grab it.

In the 16th minute, Muriel lined up a shot but took too long in getting it off and Wikelman Carmona got to it first. As a result, Muriel’s swing hit the New York midfielder instead of the ball and the resulting foul on the Orlando forward stopped another promising attack.

New York broke through moments later. Santos was beaten badly by fullback Dylan Nealis, who got into the penalty area and held off Angulo before dropping a pass for Morgan. Smith arrived at the same time as the ball but clipped Morgan and referee Victor Rivas pointed to the spot.

Morgan sent a perfect penalty inside the right post to open the scoring in the 22nd minute.

“They get the penalty, which is too easy that we let that one happen,” Jansson said. “But other than that, I don’t remember anything crazy. They created a little bit, but I do think that we had the most time on the ball and we were really trying to go for it today.”

The Smith foul was a microcosm of the first half for Orlando, which was always second quickest to 50/50 balls and every untidy touch was taken away by the visitors.

Orlando won a series of corners but did nothing with them, although one dangerous cross in was flicked on by McGuire. However, none of his teammates could get onto the end of it and New York cleared.

The Lions were lucky not to go down two goals moments later. A terrible giveaway by Santos sent the Red Bulls in transition. Dennis Gjengaar took the ball down the right and Gallese came off his line to cut down the angle. The New York winger sent his shot well wide of the near post, wasting the opportunity.

The match got a bit chippy after that, with players on both teams pushing and shoving but everyone managed to avoid a booking for it. New York did have Peter Stroud cautioned for a hard foul on Lodeiro and Andres Reyes later picked up a yellow card for a tactical foul to stop McGuire in transition.

Muriel did well to beat Coronel to a ball in the box in the 43rd minute but he had no angle to shoot. He laid the ball back to Torres, who crossed it to the far post for Thorhallsson, however, the Icelandic fullback was beaten in the air and New York cleared.

Angulo sent a bouncing ball high over the net deep in stoppage time and that was it for the first half. Orlando did some things well but the passing and touch was a bit off, playing right into New York’s pressure, and several Lions dribbled into traps the Red Bulls set and were dispossessed in a half mostly played between the penalty areas.

Orlando City finished the half with more possession (55.4%-44.6%), shot attempts (6-2), and corners (5-0), while New York passed more accurately (86.2%-83.8%) and each team put just one shot on frame.

Orlando had a couple of opportunities to start the half, but could not make them pay off. His first was a shot he pulled wide of the left post in the 52nd minute. Coronel had his near post covered anyway. Moments later, McGuire had a shot deflected into Coronel’s hands. Muriel then missed badly on a good attacking movement started with Smith sending a great ball down the left for Torres.

Jansson kept the scoreline from getting worse in the 57th minute. Santos got skinned down the flank again and the ball found its way to Gjengaar in front but Jansson slid in to deflect the shot wide.

New York again could have doubled the lead in the 64th minute when substitute Elias Manoel had a free header in the box but sent it right at Gallese. The play quickly went the other way and McGuire did well to get free of the last defender, but when he entered the box, he sent his shot straight at Coronel.

Orlando nearly got a gift of an own goal in the 73rd minute off a free kick entry that the defense smashed just wide of Coronel’s goal.

The Red Bulls should have put the game away moments later. Schlegel coughed up the ball in his own half and Morgan quickly sent the ball to the middle for a streaking Manoel, but the New York attacker sent his shot just inches wide of the left post.

Smith won Orlando a dangerous free kick two minutes later just outside the area and right in the middle, however, the Lions were called for being offside on the ensuing set piece shot by substitute Martin Ojeda. Coronel had made the save on the shot, but gave up a juicy rebound. The infraction on Orlando stopped the attack.

Pareja sent Lynn and Cesar Araujo on as late subs and it paid dividends. In the 89th minute, Angulo did well to race past the defense to get to a through ball from Araujo, and he cut toward goal, sending a dangerous ball in front. Lynn tried to backheel flick it toward goal but couldn’t make good contact, and it hit defender Noah Eile and went in to tie the score.

“Before I (sent in the centering pass), I took a look up and I saw Jack Lynn at the front post,” Angulo said through a club interpeter. “So, I crossed it and centered it his way. But the good news is that thankfully it went off the defender and resulted in that own goal that we were able to equalize with.”

The Lions looked for a late winner, but couldn’t find one. The only decent look during the five minutes of stoppage time fell for Araujo outside the area. The midfielder had a long run-up to the loose ball and smashed it toward the net, but it was always rising and fizzed over the crossbar.

Moments later, the game was over. Orlando is just 1-1-2 at home in 2024 in MLS play.

The Lions dominated possession (62.2%-37.8%) with New York content most of the second half to stay compact and look for counterattack opportunities. Orlando also finished with more shots (13-7), shots on target (4-2), and corners (8-1). With the Red Bulls playing the anywhere-will-do game in the second half, the Lions also finished as the more accurate passing team (87.6%-78.4%).

“I think we played well. We had the ball, (but it) was not really too dangerous in the opposite attacking area, unfortunately,” Jansson said. “But we’re creating a lot, bringing the ball up there, and then we need to get to the more dangerous chances to put the ball in the net.”

“We had volume, we had sequences, we had energy, we had many things that make you win games, but if you don’t have punch, then it’s not going to happen,” Pareja said. “So, we need to score goals if we want to win games. It’s not happening and I have to come up with something and help them. They are bringing a lot of energy and they have the quality.”

The Lions have next weekend off and will next be in action on April 13, when they visit Audi Field to play D.C. United.

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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.

Published

10 hours ago

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November 21, 2024

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Image courtesy of Orlando City SC / Mark Thor

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:

The purpose of this image is a table to show how Atlanta United lined up in 2024 (mostly in a 4-2-3-1 but also in one of six other formations).

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):

Table embedded as an image showing Orlando City doing best in goal differential in 12 games against three-man back lines, second best against four-man back lines, and having played once against a five-man back line (a 1-1 draw).

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:

Table embedded as an image showing the most frequently used lineups against teams who deploy four defenders. The most frequently used attacking group has a plus eight goal differential for the season.

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.

Table embedded as an image showing the most frequently used lineups against teams who deploy three defenders. The most frequently used attacking group has a plus three goal differential for the season.

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!

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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?

Published

12 hours ago

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November 21, 2024

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Image courtesy of Orlando City SC / Mark Thor

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!

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Lion Links: 11/21/24

Marta’s chance to shine in NWSL Championship, NWSL and MLS award winners announced, 2025 SheBelieves Cup details, and more.

Published

15 hours ago

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November 21, 2024

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Image courtesy of Orlando Pride

How’s it going, Mane Landers? I’ve been spending most of this week plotting out some holiday shopping to make things a little less stressful for myself over the next few weeks. A big weekend filled with Orlando soccer awaits us, so make sure to get any errands or obligations out of the way sooner rather than later. Let’s dive into today’s links!

Spotlight Falls On Marta in NWSL Championship

There are plenty of storylines heading into Saturday’s NWSL Championship between the Orlando Pride and Washington Spirit, including Marta’s opportunity to put an exclamation point on what has been an excellent season for the Pride. Orlando has been enjoying the fruits of its labor this season after a rebuild over the past few years that’s included plenty of change in the City Beautiful. Marta has been a constant, however, enduring some difficult seasons since joining the Pride and adapting her game She’s scored in both of the Pride’s playoff games so far and has a chance to author a storybook ending on Saturday.

Ann-Katrin Berger Named NWSL Goalkeeper of the Year

NJ/NY Gotham FC goalkeeper Ann-Katrin Berger was named 2024 NWSL Goalkeeper of the Year, beating out the Pride’s Anna Moorhouse and Utah Royals FC’s Mandy Haught for the honor. It was Berger’s first year in the NWSL and she’s the first European player to win the award. She only conceded 16 goals across her 22 matches for Gotham this season and was a key reason behind her team’s success. I’m not too surprised that Moorhouse did not win, considering how solid the Pride’s defense was as a whole, but this won’t take anything away from a record-breaking season for her.

Wilfried Nancy Named MLS Coach of the Year

Columbus Crew Head Coach Wilfried Nancy was voted 2024 MLS Coach of the Year after a historic season in which the Crew set club records in both points and goals. The Crew also won the Leagues Cup this summer and their 2024 Concacaf Champions Cup campaign included advancing past Tigres and Monterrey en route to the final. This is Nancy’s first time being named Coach of the Year and he has been a finalist for the award every year since 2021. The Frenchman received 40.02% of the vote, winning the award over Inter Miami’s Gerardo Martino and Colorado Rapids Head Coach Chris Armas.

2025 SheBelieves Cup Details Unveiled

The 10th annual SheBelieves Cup will take place next year and the tournament will return to its usual format where each of the four teams plays each other once. The United States Women’s National Team will host Japan, Colombia, and Australia in February in what should be an exciting tournament. The U.S. will take on Colombia on Feb. 20 in Houston before facing Australia in Arizona on Feb. 23 and finishing the tournament on Feb. 26 against Japan at Snapdragon Stadium in San Diego. These games will also be the first domestic games of 2025 for the USWNT as it prepares to qualify for the 2027 World Cup in Brazil.

Eric Quill Named FC Dallas Head Coach

FC Dallas announced that Eric Quill will become the team’s next head coach. Quill joins Dallas after a great year with New Mexico United that included trips to the U.S. Open Cup quarterfinals and USL Championship Western Conference semifinals. It’s also a reunion of sorts for Quill, as he previously coached North Texas SC and was named USL League One Coach of the Year with the club in 2019. Dallas missed out on the playoffs this season, with Peter Luccin coaching the team on an interim basis after the firing of Nico Estevez in June.

Free Kicks

  • District of Columbia Mayor Muriel Bowser challenged Orlando Mayor Buddy Dyer to a bet involving this weekend’s NWSL Championship, with embarrassing lightshows on the line.

That’s all I have for you this time around. I hope you all have a wonderful Thursday and rest of your week!

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