Orlando City
Is Luis Muriel Who We Thought He Would Be?
A thorough investigation into whether Luis Muriel has underperformed or if fans just need some dissuasion.
Winston Churchill famously evaluated what Russia would do during World War II by saying, “I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma, but perhaps there is a key.” In the grand scheme of things, the performance of one player on Orlando City’s 2024 squad is slightly less important than what Great Britain’s prime minister was discussing, I think, but when analyzing Luis Muriel and how his season has gone thus far, I continue to come back to the same question: is Luis Muriel underperforming expectations or were our expectations never correct in the first place?
Let’s get right into it — Muriel’s traditional stats thus far this season do not look fantastic for a striker (though it must be said that his post-goal dance on Saturday, dubbed “The Muriel” on this week’s episode of The Mane Land PawedCast, did look fantastic). Here is a chart, using data from fbref.com in collaboration with Opta, that shows some of his 2024 stats, their rank in MLS, and their rank on Orlando City (for some of these metrics I included a qualifier of number of attempts and chose 19 as the minimum, because for many teams that would mean a player had averaged at least one attempt per game in that category):
For a player who is, according to the MLS Players Salary Guide, the 12th-highest paid player in MLS, you would like to see a lot of those ranks closer to the top 10 or 20 in the league than what you see in that chart. For a player who is by far the highest paid on Orlando City’s 2024 team, and is the second highest-paid player ever for Orlando City (Kaká was the highest paid), you would like to see him leading the team in at least one of those categories, if not several.
The bottom two in particular stand out to me, as there are 125 MLS players who have taken at least 19 shots this season, and Muriel ranks 113th on that list in distance from the goal and 92nd in getting his shots on target, meaning he is shooting from farther away than nearly all high-volume shooters, and he is getting his shots on goal less often than most. In fact, his shot profile shows that he is taking a higher percentage of shots from 25+ yards away from the goal (dark purple section below) than any of his teammates are taking from 19+ yards away from the goal (dark purple + light purple sections), and he is taking nearly 70% of all of his shots from outside of the 18.
Now, were he putting these shots on goal — or, even better, in the goal — then nobody would care about where he was shooting from, but when you have three goals all year and 69% of your shots are not on target, then heads are going to shake, shake, shake, shake like a song by the Ying Yang Twins and Pitbull. But this is where I think a step back is needed, because if fans were expecting Muriel to come in and perform as a traditional striker or No. 9, then they were misreading his historical performance and his strengths as a player.
When you look at Muriel’s season-by-season statistics, two seasons jump out that would seem to contradict what I just wrote, and those are his 2019-2020 and 2020-2021 seasons, when he scored 18 and 22 goals, respectively.
“That seems like a lot of goals for someone you say is not a traditional striker, Andrew.”
Well, yes, but 11 of those 40 goals were from free kicks (which definitely takes skill, but skill that is not unique to a striker), and two were rebounds that fell to him inside the six-yard box, and while I do not generally love the statistic called xG (expected goals), it can be useful in some contexts, and those two rebounds both fell to Muriel in a location where a goal was expected 82% and 85% of the time. It’s almost so easy a caveman could do it.
So, either we are left with 27 of his goals (excluding 11 free kicks + two rebounds) or 29 of his goals (excluding only the 11 free kicks) that came from open play during those two high-scoring years — an average of 14.5 or 13.5 a season. Those are definitely good numbers, especially in a highly rated league like Serie A, but they are still also outliers when compared to his goals/year during most of his career.
Looking at his seasons from 2010-2011 through 2022-2023, excluding the two big seasons discussed above, Muriel averaged six non-penalty-kick goals per season. He scored those goals in Italy’s Serie A or Spain’s La Liga, top leagues, but six goals/year is not an amount generally associated with big-time strikers. To assume he would all of a sudden become a major goal scorer in the latter stages of his career just because he is joining a league rated lower than the one where he played previously is a bit of a stretch, and may be an unfair expectation by us as fans.
The other part I want to focus on that I think may be underappreciated by fans is all of the non-scoring contributions that Muriel has made during his time on the field. Yes, in the end the only stats that actually matter are goals and wins, and there have not been a lot of either thus far this season, but no single player is primarily responsible for that, even if they are a highly paid Designated Player.
A lot of the issues Orlando City has had this year are due to geometry (there will always be math when I write) and how the Lions’ shape needs to be in order to get the most out of the players on this year’s team. There are quite a lot of overlapping skills and overlapping places where players like to receive the ball, and that has frequently led to spacing issues on the field with creative players all wanting to go and get the ball in the same location at the same time.
Muriel, unlike many of his teammates, is a two-footed player and thus able to attack from anywhere on the field and in any direction, allowing him to create open spaces to play the ball all over the attacking third of the field. While this can get him into trouble (see: shots from very long range), he also has used this ability to be one of the more active and dangerous players in all of MLS when he has the ball:
As an aside, the last row there is interesting to me because Muriel ranks 16th in all of MLS, yet third on Orlando City (behind Nico Lodeiro in third overall and Facundo Torres in 15th overall). The Crew have two players in the top 16 as well, and every other player in the top 16 is the only one on his respective team. I am not sure whether Orlando City having three near the top is an example of an unselfish team that is comfortable playing the ball among playmakers or reflects a team that does not have the pecking order set, and thus it becomes a little of “my turn, your turn” type offense.
Last season, there was a clear order in that Torres led the team and was 25th in MLS, and the next-highest-ranking players were Martín Ojeda in 57th and Mauricio Pereyra in 79th. Is this something? I think it is still too early to tell, but removing own goals, Orlando City players scored 1.59 goals/game in 2023 and thus far this season they are only scoring 1.16 goals/game, and I believe that the lack of a defined primary creator is one of several contributing factors to the lower-scoring output this season.
Back to Muriel and that chart above, his talent and skill clearly shows in how he is able to thread passes into dangerous areas and create shots at a rate that puts him among the leaders in all of MLS. His dribbling ability, reflected in the progressive carry percentage, shows that he is moving the ball at least 10 yards forward towards the goal 12.7% of the time he dribbles the ball in the offensive half of the field. This puts the defense under pressure, because he is building up a head of steam and coming at pace, and since he is also completing approximately 80% of his short passes (0-15 yards) thus far this season, and completing many of those into the 18, he is a constant threat once he has the ball.
As I mentioned before, Muriel is a two-footed player (Opta’s tracking has the foot used for 83 Muriel goals — 22 were left foot and 61 were right foot, an impressive mix), so he is a player who can go left or right, is accurate with his passes in tight spaces, creates shooting opportunities for his teammates, and wants the ball at all times. These are all qualities you want in an attacking player, especially one as proficient as Muriel is in them.
So we return to the riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma — a player with clear skill and pedigree who is contributing offensively but is not putting up the counting stats fans thought he would, even though he never really did aside from two outlier years. As much as I like to be more glass-half-full than half-empty, I do feel like Muriel should have contributed more goals by this point in the season, but unlike what the fan sitting next to me said during Saturday’s game, I do not think he is massively underperforming either.
In the end, I think Muriel’s performance thus far has been kind of like where we frequently see him on the field, more in the middle than in the front.
Orlando City
Orlando City vs. New York City FC: Final Score 4-2 as Lions Lose Stajduhar to Injury in Road Loss
It was yet another night to forget at Yankee Stadium for the Lions as a terrible first half made the mountain too steep to climb.
Orlando City lost Mason Stajduhar to injury and ultimately lost the game 4-2 to New York City FC at Yankee Stadium. The Lions (5-9-6, 21 points) never play well on the baseball diamond, but it was egregiously bad on this night as they turned the ball over in dangerous areas, failed to cover defensively, got out-hustled often, and mounted almost no threat whatsoever in the first half of a thorough beat down at the hands of the Pigeons (10-8-2, 32 points), who had scored only one goal all month and hadn’t won a game in June. The second half was better, but ultimately it was not enough to get a result.
Santiago Rodriguez, Hannes Wolf, and Augustin Ojeda put the hosts up at halftime and NYCFC got a late insurance goal from Mounsef Bakrar when the Lions tried to make things interesting in the final minutes. Dagur Dan Thorhallsson and Duncan McGuire pulled the Lions within a goal in stoppage time, but couldn’t fashion a final chance before the game was put to bed.
Stajduhar had to leave on a stretcher early in the game after a horrible collision that could have been prevented by an offside flag on an easy call, but assistant referees today are asked to let an attack play out, just in case. In this case, it hurt two players and changed the game.
“A game with two different halves,” Orlando City Head Coach Oscar Pareja said after the match. “It was unacceptable the way we played in the first half and just me taking that responsibility first for the way we came (out), especially in those first 30 minutes. Second half, much better. I thought it was the team that we want to see. The reaction was very good from our players. We could have tied the game, and then on that last play they scored the fourth goal.”
Pareja switched back to a 4-2-3-1 and replaced Luis Muriel in the lineup with Martin Ojeda. Stajduhar started in goal behind a back line of Rafael Santos, Rodrigo Schlegel, Robin Jansson, and Thorhallsson. Cesar Araujo and Nico Lodeiro started in central midfield behind an attacking line of Ivan Angulo, Ojeda, and Facundo Torres with McGuire up top.
The Lions created a great chance almost immediately. Angulo took the ball away at midfield and sent it left for Martin Ojeda. The Argentine sent in a cross that ended up finding its way back to Angulo inside the box, but the Colombian fired his shot right at goalkeeper Matt Freese for an easy save.
It’s impossible to say where the game may have gone from there had Angulo been any kind of clinical on the shot, but it may have lifted Orlando and weighed heavily on an NYCFC team that hadn’t scored in its last two games. Instead, the hosts came into the game largely on Orlando mistakes in possession and coverage failures.
Before the New York City onslaught started, Martin Ojeda found himself with the ball outside the area in the 11th minute. The Designated Player telegraphed his impatient shot attempt, so it was not surprising to see it blocked.
The first warning sign came in the 13th minute when Orlando turned the ball over on an obviously telegraphed pass and ignited the break. Martinez broke in behind and Stajduhar made the save to keep it scoreless. Stajduhar made an even bigger save two minutes later when Martinez blazed past an inattentive Jansson and fired.
Orlando paid no heed to the warning signs, as once again the Lions turned the ball over just after Stajduhar’s big stop. New York City struck in the 15th minute as Lodeiro was caught in possession by Alonso Martinez and turned it over. The ball moved from the left to the middle to Rodriguez, and since no one closed him down, he smashed a shot from distance just inside the left post to make it 1-0.
“I think we conceded that goal and it knocks us out, which is not acceptable,” Thorhallsson said. “It’s up to us, the team, to help each other to bounce back, and I felt like we were just knocked out completely the first half. It’s something we need to work out and find out why it happens because it’s not acceptable.”
Disaster struck in the 17th minute when a ball was played forward for Malachi Jones, who was a good couple of yards offside. The flag stayed down, as is the current practice, and Jones and Stajduhar collided just outside the box with their legs coming together. Both players were injured in the crash and then the flag came up. Stajduhar was in obvious distress immediately and spent several minutes lying on the pitch with the trainers working on him before he was stretchered off. Javier Otero was forced into his MLS debut in a less-than-ideal situation — on the road and on the small Yankee Stadium pitch. Jones was also injured and was replaced by Augustin Ojeda.
Thorhallsson was close to the play when the injury to Stajduhar happened.
“The ball came in behind me, and then I see Mason run out,” he said. “I think he kicks the ball and the other guy comes, and I just hear a loud, basically like a click. He’s screaming and I didn’t know what it was. And then I look at his leg, and his leg was dangling, and I just looked away and basically just wanted to go, so I went to the stands, and just stood there with my eyes closed.”
The injury was preventable, said Pareja.
“They need to get better at this ruling of just allowing (play to continue) when the offside is very obvious,” Pareja said. “I think they need to flag the play. This is a very unnecessary play just to let it go, and we can avoid a lot of injuries. Today is a demonstration that we can do better.”
Lodeiro conceded a dangerous free kick near the left corner of the box in the 37th minute when he was called for a handball, but Rodriquez fizzed his shot over the crossbar.
Schlegel made a good play in the 41st minute to keep the deficit at one. He did well to clear a dangerous cross from the left side.
Martin Ojeda sent a back-post cross for Torres in the 45th minute that went just over the Uruguayan’s head. The fourth official showed 13 minutes of stoppage time, owing to the lengthy delay for Stajduhar’s injury. That turned out to be the difference between having a shot in the second half and being blown out.
Schlegel did well again to snuff out a dangerous attack and win a goal kick in the second minute of injury time.
Two minutes later, the Pigeons doubled their lead on a preventable goal. Angulo did well to track back and beat Tayvon Gray to the ball on a forward ball from Thiago Martins. Angulo tried to shepherd the ball out but made a mess of it. Gray tapped the ball into the middle and Wolf was the first to it, hitting a shot that deflected inside the far post off Jansson. Otero had no shot at stopping it, and NYCFC led 2-0.
“There was a bunch of plays in the first half that we did not recognize ourselves, especially in the moments that we needed to defend much better than that and make better decisions,” Pareja said. “It was disappointing for ourselves. And this is me taking that responsibility first.”
Orlando survived a couple more turnovers and finally found an attacking movement, sending Santos down the left flank. However, despite having tons of space and time, the Brazilian defender sent his cross straight to the goalkeeper with teammates breaking to the top of the six.
The defense was nowhere to be seen on New York City’s third goal. Martins played a simple through ball and no one was anywhere close to Gray, who simply crossed it through the area to a wide-open Augustin Ojeda to tap in late in stoppage time.
“The first half, we just committed those mistakes that just put us in a very, very difficult position,” Pareja said.
Thorhallsson made a good play to track back and prevent a fourth goal and then the halftime whistle mercifully ended the Lions’ misery.
The halftime statistics were indicative of the performance. NYCFC had the advantage in possession (57%-43%), shots (10-2), shots on target (5-1), corners (1-0), and passing accuracy (88.8%-82.6%). A team that hadn’t produced much in the way of scoring chances all month long had zero trouble accepting the many Orlando turnovers and cutting through a passive City defense that looked like it was still asleep at the team hotel.
“The first half we just didn’t show up,” Thorhallsson said. “We were losing first balls, losing second balls, getting easy goals (against).”
Lodeiro came off at halftime for rookie Jeorgio Kocevski after a poor night for the Uruguayan veteran.
To Orlando’s credit, the Lions kept battling, despite the long odds. Torres took the first shot of the second half after receiving it with his back to goal and spinning, but his effort bounced weakly wide of the net.
A minute later, Otero nearly had a collision of his own when he came out to knock the ball away from an obviously offside Martinez. Martin Ojeda then blasted a shot on target off a Torres pass sent him down the left channel. The shot had a lot of pace but was at the perfect height for Freese to get a hand on it and he made the save.
McGuire set up Angulo in the 59th minute but the Colombian hit the post and the flag came up for the striker being offside on the long ball anyway. Two minutes later, Torres cut into the middle but slipped while shooting and sent it right at Freese. Orlando then won its first corner of the game but Araujo got well under the service on his header.
Second-half sub Luis Muriel had a go from distance in the 71st minute but got well under his shot and sent it high over the bar. A minute later, the Lions finally spoiled the shutout.
Kocevski started the play in the middle, spraying the ball left for Martin Ojeda, who found himself in space. Ojeda sent his cross toward the penalty spot and Thorhallsson got his head to it. Although he didn’t get much pace on the shot, the Icelandic fullback placed it perfectly inside the left post to make it 3-1 in the 72nd minute.
Muriel again found himself in space in the 74th minute, and once again he skied his shot way over the bar from outside the box.
NYCFC finally broke up the Orlando attack and had one of its own in the 76th minute, but Martinez sent a weak header wide of the left post.
Torres had a good opportunity to close the gap to one goal a minute later. Left in space, the winger smashed a shot that might have changed things had he not sent it too close to Freese. The goalkeeper made the save.
The teams exchanged unsuccessful corners down the stretch and Ojeda sent a good, right-footed effort that was again too close to Freese in the 89th minute.
Only three minutes of stoppage time were added at the end, and Orlando used the first of those to make things interesting for a few seconds. Thorhallsson cut into the box and appeared to make one pass too many with an opportunity to shoot. The ball ended up at the back post and Wolf tried to knock it back to Freese, who couldn’t pick it up and struggled with his clearance. Muriel knocked it back into the keeper and it bounced to McGuire, who poked it in to make it 3-2 in the 91st minute.
The last gasp chance for the Lions turned into NYCFC’s fourth goal. With only seconds remaining, Thorhallsson had a chance to send the ball forward but opted to try to work it short to Kocevski. The turnover ended up with second-half sub Bakrar, who was easily able to blow past Araujo and curl in a perfect back-post shot that Otero couldn’t reach, making it 4-2 with the last kick of the game.
“I felt like we came out really strong and scored two goals,” Thorhallsson said about the second half. “And then it’s on me that I lose the ball on the fourth goal when we’re trying to go forward, and I take full responsibility for that.”
NYCFC finished with the edge in possession (54.3%-45.7%), corners (3-2), and passing accuracy (85.6%-81.9%). Orlando City ended up with more shots (15-14) and shots on target (8-6). In the end, the Lions were simply too poor in the first half to keep the game within reach, and despite a good second-half showing, it was all for nothing in the end, with more dropped points in a tight battle for the bottom playoff places.
“It’s about finding the balance like we have done before, and we know how to do it,” Thorhallsson said about the team’s leaky defense at a time when the offense has scored eight goals in three games. “I feel like the balance isn’t quite there and that’s something that we need to look at. It’s good that we started scoring, but now we need to find the solution for not conceding so many goals.”
The Lions go from a normal week to a short turnaround as they’ll travel to Canada for a Wednesday night clash with Toronto FC.
Orlando City
Orlando City vs. New York City FC: Preview, How to Watch, TV Info, Live Stream, Lineups, Match Thread, and More
The Lions take on their fellow 2015 expansion foes looking for a rare road win in the series.
Welcome to your match thread and preview for a Friday night matchup between Orlando City (5-8-6, 21 points) and New York City FC (9-8-2, 29 points) at Yankee Stadium (7:30 p.m., MLS Season Pass on Apple TV+). This is the first of the two scheduled meetings between the Lions and Pigeons this season, with NYCFC set to make the return trip to Orlando on July 20.
Here is what you need to know ahead of the match.
History
The Lions are 7-8-7 in 22 meetings with NYCFC in the all-time series in MLS play and 7-8-9 including one playoff match and one U.S. Open Cup meeting (remember, games that go to penalty shootouts in knockout competitions officially count as draws), so the series between the two 2015 expansion sides has proven to be a competitive one. Orlando is just 2-6-2 in road games in the all-time series.
The last time these teams met was at Citi Field — a different baseball stadium than NYCFC’s usual one — on Sept. 20, 2023. The Pigeons were rude hosts, winning 2-0 on goals by Mounsef Bakrar and Talles Magno. It snapped Orlando’s five-game unbeaten run but the Lions clinched a playoff spot that day anyway due to other results around the league.
These teams also met last year in Orlando on May 17, and with the Lions poised for a 1-0 win, NYCFC eked out a late 1-1 draw with an 89th-minute Gabriel Segal goal out of nowhere. Ercan Kara scored for Orlando City early on, but the Lions were wasteful with opportunities for the rest of the match.
The teams faced off at Red Bull Arena (one of NYCFC’s many homes away from home) on Oct. 2, 2022, with the Pigeons erasing a 1-0 halftime deficit that Facundo Torres provided. The “hosts” got second-half goals from Alex Callens and Magno to complete the comeback and win, 2-1. Earlier in the year at Exploria Stadium, the Lions got a Tesho Akindele goal at the death, stunning NYCFC as Orlando City won 2-1 on Aug. 28, 2022. Junior Urso and Maxi Moralez had scored early in the first and second half, respectively, to set up Akindele’s dramatic late winner.
Orlando City had a five-game unbeaten streak in the series (1-0-4) absolutely demolished on July 25, 2021 in a 5-0 OCSC loss at Yankee Stadium. The Lions started a makeshift lineup, and it showed, as the Pigeons got goals from Jesus Medina, Ismael Tajouri-Shradi, Moralez, Malte Amundsen, and Valentin Castellanos. Why the makeshift lineup? That match was sandwiched between home games against Philadelphia and Atlanta, with quick turnarounds for each. The strategy was sound, as Orlando won the other two games in that nine-day span.
The teams met in Orlando on May 8, 2021 and drew 1-1. Nani smashed a golazo in the second half to put the Lions on top, but Joao Moutinho fouled Tajouri-Shradi in the box and Castellanos scored from the spot to equalize.
The last meeting of the 2020 season happened in the postseason and things got weird. Orlando City ultimately prevailed in penalties after a 1-1 postseason draw on Nov. 21, 2020. Nani put Orlando ahead from the penalty spot, only to see Maxime Chanot equalize on a set piece. Extra time couldn’t settle it, so to penalties we went, and the Lions advanced thanks to a save by defender Rodrigo Schlegel — after goalkeeper Pedro Gallese was sent off with a second yellow for coming off his line early. Benji Michel’s blast was the difference in the shootout. (Seriously, just click the above link in this paragraph and relive that madness.)
The Lions and Pigeons wrapped the 2020 season series on Oct. 14 at Exploria Stadium, playing to a 1-1 draw. Chris Mueller opened the scoring but Keaton Parks equalized just before halftime. The first meeting of 2020 also took place in Central Florida in the MLS is Back Tournament on July 14, when Mueller’s brace and a late Akindele insurance goal led Orlando to a 3-1 win. Medina scored for NYCFC. That win snapped Orlando City’s 0-4-3 streak in the previous seven competitive meetings with the Pigeons. The last match in that winless streak against NYCFC was a 1-1 draw, with the Lions then dispatching NYCFC from the U.S. Open Cup in a penalty shootout on July 10, 2019. That night has been immortalized for the running of The Wall and Adam Grinwis’ heroics in goal.
The teams drew both regular-season meetings in 2019, 1-1 on April 27 at Yankee Stadium, and 2-2 on opening day at Exploria Stadium. NYCFC took all three meetings in a dismal 2018 season series. The Lions went 2-1-0 against New York City FC in 2017, including a win to christen the stadium now known as Exploria with Cyle Larin scoring the only goal in a 1-0 OCSC win. Orlando was 3-1-2 in 2015 and 2016 in the first six meetings with NYCFC.
Match Overview
Orlando City is coming off a 4-2 home win over the Chicago Fire on Saturday. Torres scored a brace, Luis Muriel fired home frmo the penalty spot, and Ivan Angulo added a goal to more than offset a Maren Haile-Sellasse penalty and a goal by Hugo Cuypers. That snapped a five-game winless skid for the Lions (0-3-2) and now Orlando is on a two-game unbeaten run (1-0-1). City has been even-Steven on the road, playing to a 3-3-3 record in nine away matches.
New York City FC is 6-3-1 at home in 2024, but the Pigeons have lost their last three games in a row, getting shut out in their last two. The Lions are typically good for struggling offenses, such as allowing two against 10-man Charlotte in the team’s most recent road outing. NYCFC has scored three more goals than Orlando City on the season (26-23), but has also conceded eight fewer goals (23-31).
Santiago Rodriguez has been the primary weapon for NYCFC this season, leading the club with seven goals and six assists. Alonso Martinez has six goals and an assist.
The Lions will need to adapt to the smaller playing surface of Yankee Stadium, where the ball must move more quickly and accurately to get through the smaller spaces available. Poor first touches will be punished and Orlando can’t be shy about shooting from everywhere when there’s an opening.
“We try to simulate them [New York City FC] the best we can. That pitch and the challenges we have when we go to New York and that pitch,” Orlando City Head Coach Oscar Pareja said. “The other thing is that it’s football. Try to recognize what their weaknesses are and what other things they do well that we can control. Again, just trying to continue the good things we’ve done, especially in the last game where we scored four goals. The boys felt much more like themselves in front of the goal and we’re aiming for that.”
Orlando City will be without internationals Pedro Gallese, Wilder Cartagena, and David Brekalo, as well as Michael Halliday (knee). Homegrown fullback Tahir Reid-Brown (thigh) has been upgraded to questionable, joining Ramiro Enrique (personal matter) and Felipe (foot). New York City has a clean bill of health and is missing no internationals.
Match Content
- Our most recent PawedCast includes our key matchups and score predictions for tonight’s game.
- Our Intelligence Report by Ben Miller provides the latest info on New York City FC from Hudson River Blue’s Matthew Mangam.
- Our David Rohe provided his three keys to an Orlando City victory against NYCFC.
Official Lineups
Orlando City (4-2-3-1)
Goalkeeper: Mason Stajduhar.
Defenders: Rafael Santos, Robin Jansson, Rodrigo Schlegel, Dagur Dan Thorhallsson.
Defensive Midfielders: Nico Lodeiro, Cesar Araujo.
Attacking Midfielders: Ivan Angulo, Martin Ojeda, Facundo Torres.
Forward: Duncan McGuire.
Bench: Javier Otero, Kyle Smith, Alex Freeman, Thomas Williams, Jeorgio Kocevski, Felipe, Favian Loyola, Luis Muriel, Jack Lynn.
New York City FC (4-2-3-1)
Goalkeeper: Matt Freese.
Defenders: Kevin O’Toole, Birk Risa, Thiago Martins, Tayvon Gray.
Defensive Midfielders: Keaton Parks James Sands.
Attacking Midfielders: Malachi Jones, Santiago Rodriguez, Hannes Wolf.
Forwards Alonso Martinez.
Bench: Luis Barraza, Strahinja Tanasijević, Mitja Ilenic, Andres Perea, Maxi Moralez, Julian Fernandez, Mounsef Bakrar, Augustin Ojeda, Jovan Mijatović.
Referees:
REF: Sergii Boiko.
AR1: Ian McKay.
AR2: Brian Dunn.
4TH: Elvis Osmanovic.
VAR: Daniel Radford.
AVAR: Jonathan Johnson.
How to Watch
Match Time: 7:30 p.m.
Venue: Yankee Stadium — Bronx, NY.
TV/Live Stream: MLS Season Pass on Apple TV+.
Radio: FM 96.9 The Game (English), Mega 97.1 FM (Spanish).
Twitter: For rapid reaction and live updates, follow along at @TheManeLand, as well as Orlando City’s official Twitter feed (@OrlandoCitySC).
Enjoy the match. Go City!
Orlando City
Intelligence Report: Orlando City vs. New York City FC
Get all of the insider info on NYCFC, courtesy of someone who knows them best.
Orlando City’s next matchday has come a day early this week, as the Lions have an oddly placed Friday tilt up in the Bronx against New York City FC.
A date with NYCFC means that I caught up with Matthew Mangam, a senior writer over at Hudson River Blue. As usual, he was very helpful in getting us up to speed on how things have been faring for the Pigeons. I also answered some of his questions about Orlando City, which you can find over at their place.
Talk me through NYCFC’s off-season transfer business. Who were some notable names who left, and who has been brought in to replace them?
Matthew Mangam: NYCFC’s departures in the off-season were nothing notable. All three main departures — Braian Cufré, Richy Ledezma, and Alfredo Morales — did not contribute much to the team at all. Morales was the only player who was a part of NYCFC’s 2021 MLS Cup win. Gabe Segal also left as well, a striker who wasn’t given much of a chance at all but did score when called upon. Hannes Wolf was brought in as a winger, and has found his form after a poor start to the season. Agustín Ojeda is another example of this, a young winger who is getting better and better with time. Andrés Perea’s loan from Philadelphia was made permanent after an outstanding end to the 2023 campaign. Kevin O’Toole, a draft pick from 2022, took the job as the starting left back to take the spot from Cufré.
Of those signings, who has most impressed you so far? Who should Orlando City fans have an eye on during this match?
MM: Wolf has impressed me the most. In May, he had two goals and two assists in three games during NYCFC’s five-game winning streak. Wolf has started 17 of 19 matches but had a poor start to the season. There was tons of hype about him due to Wolf previously playing in the Bundesliga with Borussia Mönchengladbach. Despite that, I think Orlando fans should have an eye on Malachi Jones. The eighth overall pick in the 2023 MLS SuperDraft was not expected to be a key part of the team this season. He’s fast, dangerous, and creative. He’ll give the Orlando back line trouble and always brings a spark off the bench.
After winning five of six matches during May, NYCFC has had a tougher time in June, dropping all three games it’s played. What does the team need to do in order to get back to winning ways?
MM: The team just needs its offensive spark back. NYCFC played Columbus close but lost on a controversial penalty call. The defeats to the LA Galaxy and Nashville were disappointing, with the team lacking that crucial touch in the final third. Mounsef Bakrar did not look good in either game, and I think Alonso Martínez starting up top would benefit the team greatly. Get Martínez as the striker, and as long as the wingers can do their thing, NYCFC will score goals.
Will any players be unavailable due to injuries, suspensions, call-ups etc.? What is your projected starting lineup and score prediction?
MM: NYCFC has no players injured or on international duty.
Matt Freese; Kevin O’Toole, Birk Risa, Thiago Martins, Tayvon Gray; James Sands, Keaton Parks; Malachi Jones, Santi Rodriguez, Hannes Wolf; Alonso Martinez.
With that being said, NYCFC will tie with Orlando 2-2, I believe.
Thank you to Matthew for the update on NYCFC. Vamos Orlando!
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