Orlando City at Chicago Fire: Five Takeaways

Orlando City traveled to the Windy City with a good chance to take home all three points. That wasn’t the case, as the Lions allowed a second-half goal and drew the Chicago Fire 1-1 at Soldier Field. It wouldn’t be an Orlando City match if there wasn’t controversy involving the referee and video review, but we’ll get to that soon enough. What follows are my immediate takeaways from a sloppy and frustrating draw on the road.

Ugly Goals Still Count

It’s been a hot minute since Facundo Torres has scored a goal, but he didn’t have to wait too long in this match to get back on the board. Ivan Angulo and Luis Muriel combined in the attacking midfield to get into the final third with the ball finding Torres in the box. At that point he took too many touches, got closed down, and it became a scrum in front of goal. After the ball pinged in, out, and all around, Torres found himself climbing off the pitch, only to take squib of a shot while falling down that somehow got through the tangle of legs and went into the bottom left corner of the goal. It was ugly, but exactly what Orlando City needed to get things started.

Defensive Holes Evident

I will admit that my prediction was wrong. I thought that the return of Robin Jansson would mean that Oscar Pareja would go back to the 4-2-3-1 formation he usually deployed. Instead, he stayed with the 3-5-2 he’s used the last several matches, with Jansson playing on the left of the three-man back line. Chicago is not a very good attacking team, but the Fire consistently found space in the box, and made Orlando City pay for it in the 70th minute. Good thing there wasn’t a video review decision that impacted the match. Oh wait.

Another Brick in the Wall

Orlando City was once again the victim of poor officiating and inconsistent application of video review in calling penalties. Angulo took a nice pass from Nico Lodeiro, slipped between two Chicago defenders, made his way into the box, made a move around the keeper, and then was fouled…twice. The keeper clipped him, and then the defender fouled him from behind. I thought it was a penalty, the commentators on Apple TV+ thought it was a penalty, and everyone except Fire fans, PRO referees, video assistant referee Edvin Jurisevic, and Don Garber thought it was a penalty. Unfortunately, it’s just another example of the “if it helps Orlando City, it’s not a foul/penalty” that we have seen so many times this season. Not only should it have been a penalty, it should have been a sending off for denial of a goal-scoring opportunity.

Poor Passing

Much of the match, Orlando City looked like a team not on the same page. Too many times players tried to be too clever when making a pass. Too many times the ball was played into spaces allowing a turnover. Too many explicit turnovers. Too many heavy passes, too many light passes — none of it what we expect from this team. Don’t let the 83% team passing percentage fool you. This was a disorganized team when in possession playing against Chicago.

Tired Legs or Tired Minds?

This match was Orlando City’s sixth match of the month. That is a lot of games. I’m not certain that the team looked tired when running, but as I noted above, the passing wasn’t good and that can come from your brain being tired. A tired player will try to do something they shouldn’t, thinking they can, or take too long to do what they should do. How many times did a player take way too much time to even think about taking a shot? Orlando City usually generates plenty of chances on goal. Against Chicago, the Lions only managed eight shots with two on goal. It was all just not crisp enough.

Those are the things I observed in the once-again frustrating draw against the Fire. Let us know in the comments below what stood out to you. As always, vamos Orlando!