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Orlando City vs. CF Montreal: Player Grades and Man of the Match

How did your favorite Lions perform in Orlando City’s 2-1 home win against CF Montreal?

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3 months ago

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Image of Ivan Angulo with his Man of the Match trophy after beating CF Montreal.
Image courtesy of Orlando City SC / Mark Thor

Orlando City won 2-1 over CF Montreal at home in the first match following the parting of ways with longtime head coach Oscar Pareja. A strong first half was enough to see the Lions through against a Montreal side that is having struggles of its own. The Cardiac Cats were true to form though, as some desperate defending was needed right up to the end to secure the result.

The grades below come against less-than-elite competition, but the Lions should still be judged on their efforts regardless of the opposition. So let’s take a look at how the Orlando City players performed individually in this game.

Starters

GK, Javier Otero, 6 — In his first start of the year, due to a Maxime Crepeau red card earned in last week’s match against New York City FC, Otero put in a respectable shift. Montreal was not exactly clinical, but when Otero was tested he was up to he challenge — four out of five times anyway. He was generally aggressive, defending his goal on corners and free kicks suffering two fouls in the match. His distribution was something I cant recall thinking about, which is a good thing. A few of his saves were on ping pong balls that he had to react quickly to, which he managed well. For me, one highlight was a tactical “cramp” he incurred which allowed time for Tyrese Spicer to get on the pitch who was waiting out a delayed entry due to Marco Pasalic taking too long to get off the pitch when he was subbed out. It was a good heads-up play by the keeper. Overall, a respectable bounce back after an abysmal match in New York. His pass accuracy was not great, especially for a goalkeeper at 63% on 28 passes. He completed seven out of 15 long balls. There’s no doubt Crepeau will be back between the sticks next week, but you learn by doing, and nothing beats a real match. Oteror did well this time out and that gives a little hope for the next time he’s called into action.

D, Adrian Marin, 7 — In one of his best, if not the best, performances as an Orlando left back, Marin made several key plays throughout the match and, significantly, did not commit any major mistakes. In fact, he had the most tackles of any Orlando player (4), including an absolute clutch tip of the toe tackle on Hennadii Synchuk and a nice steal off of Prince Owusu when he was threatening from the end line. He also had the most fouls on the team at three, suffering one, but given the defensive nature of much of Orlando’s play, that’s kind of understandable and none were considered card worthy. He had five clearances and a blocked shot. He also had an abysmal 52,2% pass accuracy on 12 attempts and did not connect on any of six long balls. Better but not great.

D, Iago, 6.5 — It’s just one game, but Iago acquitted himself much better this time out than in his previous Orlando City matches. He was proactive and anticipated dangerous situations on a few occasions. He had two interceptions and was second only to David Brekalo for the most clearances (8). He also tallied one block and he committed one foul. He passed at 94.1% and hit on three out of five long balls. Iago appeared much more competent and alert in this match and we can, hopefully, take this as stepping stone along the path to greater things. It was against a struggling side in Montreal, but Iago’s play seemed to justify a little more breathing room on its own merit. He is a young player in an alien land and is showing improvement, which might be all we can hope for at this point.

D, David Brekalo, 6 — Brekalo spent most of his time involved in emergency defending. He did not seem to anticipate a lot, and was mostly invisible. It wasn’t a terrible outing, and maybe his assignment was to hold down his piece of real estate? If that’s the case, then he did pretty well and only committed one foul. He cleared what came his way — a team-high nine clearances — and managed a header on a set piece in the first half. He also recorded a block and hit on three out of four long balls with a passing accuracy of 90.9%.

D, Griffin Dorsey, 6.5 — This match seemed like a slight regression for Dorsey to me, at least in the attacking phases. It was a good match though, and maybe it’s a function of the rest of the team making more of an impact themselves. He did defend well against Prince Owusu and Ivan Jaime, Montreal’s two most effective attackers on the night. Jaime was a handful in the second half and got past Dorsey on at least one occasion, but overall Dorsey did pretty well against he and Owusu. He committed one foul and suffered one foul. He passed at an 88.9% accuracy with one key pass. Defensively, he had one tackle, three clearances, and a block.

MF, Ivan Angulo, 8 (MotM) — Well that’s two weeks in a row that Angulo managed a Man of the Match effort! Pretty low bar this season, but this match was Angulo’s for sure. From my point of view, there’s something not quite intangible, but close to it about the Colombian. He’s absurdly fast, that’s obvious. His effort is off the charts. He does not generally have the greatest touch when he needs it the most. What he has though, is a pretty good ability to snuff out danger and turn it into an attack. His usual downfall is his inability to maintain composure in and around the 18-yard box. Against Montreal though, he was excellent. He was chasing down broken plays, he was anticipating attacks, and he was precise and thoughtful in his buildup play, even in front of Montreal’s goal. He only took one shot, which pinged off the post and rebounded for Duncan McGuire’s goal, but he was a major factor in both Orlando City goals. He finished with three key passes, two dribbles, and passed at an 87.1% accuracy on 32 attempts. He connected on three of four long balls as well. He was dispossessed twice and had three unstable touches, but at least this time those were offset. He suffered one foul and committed two. All things must be taken with a grain of salt in this early, difficult, and unprecedented season, but Angulo has shown some growth in his game and I think he deserves a lot of credit for that. Let’s hope he can sustain it.

MF, Eduard Atuesta, 5.5 — I’m typically a fan of Atuesta. He was not on LAFC’s cup-winning roster for nothing, but Atuesta gave a lot away in his minutes on the pitch in this one. This was his first start of the season and there has been a lot of change on this roster, which should not be underestimated. However, he had a couple of pretty gnarly give aways and some tortoise-like slowness at times even though he did not lack for overall effort. He had only one interception on the night, committed one foul, and had no other defensive contributions. He passed with 81.8% accuracy on 22 attempts and connected on one long ball in three attempts. He picked up the game’s only yellow card with a late and clumsy challenge. Atuesta just did not seem to be up to the speed of the match this time out and tired notably in the second half, but I expect him to return to form soon after kicking some rust off.

MF, Braian Ojeda, 7 — Defensive Ojeda did a great job…especially on offense! He had three key passes and two successful dribbles, and he was fouled four times to slow him down. I really liked his play in this match, and he did a lot to facilitate the success of Angulo, Martin Ojeda, and McGuire. He committed one foul, passed at 92.1% on 38 attempts, and had one long-ball attempt that did not connect. Stats are essential, but they only tell you what they can tell you. The midfielder showed an aptitude for positive passes. That’s what impressed me, not just the success or otherwise of the execution, nor defensive stats, but that he could see what needed to be done in the moment to facilitate the attack. This could just be a one-off case, but he picked out multiple passes that looked to unlock the defense from deep lying areas, and that’s fairly rare. Defensively, he finished with one interception, two clearances, and two blocks. I liked what I saw on this one, so I’m rating him pretty high.

MF, Marco Pasalic, 6 — Pasalic had two early misses, the second of which he had a half second more or so to settle than he seemed to think. He had four shots on the night, but they weren’t on target, and he got dispossessed three times, had two unstable touches, and suffered one foul. His passing was very good at 91.7% although his one long ball did not connect. Importantly, he played a major role in both goals. His blast from outside the area pinged off mutliple defenders before finding Angulo in front on McGuire’s goal. On the second, it was his give-and-go with Angulo that resulted in Martin Ojeda’s game-winner, with Pasalic picking up a secondary assist.

F, Duncan McGuire, 7 — McGuire had a good night. He only had two shots, but both were on target and one was an opportunistic goal off of an Angulo rebound that hit the post. It was his first goal of the season, and it must be good to get on the scoresheet. He helped out in defense, as usual, with a couple tackles, a clearance, and a block. But he also made some nice flicks to help build up the attack. I think he showed some real vision in this one and he executed it well. He passed at a 58.8% rate, not great but he is a striker, and suffered one foul and committed none. This was a good outing for Duncan in my opinion and it was mostly his help in the build up that impressed me in this one.

F, Martin Ojeda, 7.5 — Offensive Ojeda was his typical effective-attacker self against Montreal. He was all over the pitch facilitating and getting results on his own. He took two shots, both on target, including scoring the winning goal. He recorded two key passes and was fouled once. He passed at a 62.5% rate on 22 attempts, three of his six crosses found a target, and he connected on his lone long ball as well.

Substitutes

D, Zakaria Taifi (61′), 6 — I’ll give Taifi some credit for his efforts in his second appearance this year. He was getting involved and clearly put in some hard work in his limited time in this match. He even managed to put his lone shot on target, although Montreal goalkeeper Thomas Gillier saved it easily and a pass to Dorsey or back to Angulo may have been the better decision. Going for goal was understandable though, given the limited opportunities for the substitute. Taifi did pretty well in defense as well contributing two clearances and a vital block late in the match on Jaime, committing one foul. He attempted seven passes with 57.1% accuracy.

MF, Colin Guske (61′), 6.5 — Guske did well in his minutes, helping to snuff out Montreal’s efforts in what had become a pretty defensive posture for Orlando. On the offensive side of things, he took one shot in the 90th minute that was blocked and he was fouled once. He connected on his one long ball attempt and completed all eight of his pass attempts. Defensively he managed one tackle and four clearances, and he committed one foul.

F, Tyrese Spicer (71′), 4.5 — Spicer came on for Pasalic and brought his usual energy but did not produce much. He only attempted three passes and did not connect on any of them, nor his lone long ball attempt. He attempted two shots with one on target, but it was on a breakaway after a bad Montreal giveaway. He should have done better with his 1-v-1 opportunity against the goalkeeper to put the game out of reach. His other was a free kick right into the wall. He was dispossessed once as well. He managed two tackles and a clearance with his defensive efforts.

D, Tahir Reid-Brown (84′) N/A — Reid-Brown did a decent job in this one given his limited minutes. He made three pass attempts completing two (66.7% accuracy) and attempted one cross and one long ball, neither of which found a target. He had no defensive contributions to speak of and wasn’t on long enough to fairly earn a grade.

F, Pedro Leao (84′) N/A — In a bit of a surprise substitution, Orlando City B’s Pedro Leao got his first minutes for the first team. He hit the ground running immediately, getting involved in the attack and earning a free kick just outside the 18-yard box. Not much else came from his efforts though, and he suffered two fouls and was dispossessed twice and he attempted two passes with one complete. He also had no defensive contributions.

That’s how i saw the individual performances in a much-needed Orlando win. Let us know how you saw the game in the comments below, and don’t forget to vote for your Man of the Match.

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Orlando City

Flashback Friday: June 3, 2023 vs. New York Red Bulls

Let’s rewind to an eventful match on the road up in New Jersey that took place just over three years ago.

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2 days ago

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June 5, 2026

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Image courtesy of Orlando City SC / Mark Thor

With Orlando City on break for the foreseeable future, it falls to me to keep bringing you fond memories from OCSC games of years gone by. We won’t be going quite as deep into the vault as we did last week, when we rewound to nine years ago and relived a wet and weird win over D.C. United. Today, we’ll go a little over three years into the past to June 3, 2023, when the Lions hit the road to take on the New York Red Bulls.

As Orlando prepared to face the Red Bulls after opening the season against them at home, things were going pretty well for the Lions. They were riding a four-game unbeaten streak that included some solid results on the road and sought to continue that trend up in Harrison, NJ.

To do that, then-coach Oscar Pareja sent out the team in his traditional 4-2-3-1. Pedro Gallese was in net, while Kyle Smith, Antonio Carlos, Robin Jansson, and Rafael Santos manned the back line. Cesar Araujo and Wilder Cartagena sat in deep midfield as the double pivots, Ivan Angulo, Mauricio Pereyra, and Facundo Torres were the attacking midfielders, and Ercan Kara was deployed as the tip of the proverbial spear.

By and large, the first half wasn’t the most engaging 45 minutes of soccer that Orlando City has ever graced us with. The first 15 minutes saw a lot of fouls and fairly sloppy play, with the game lacking any real rhythm but featuring plenty of stops, starts, and turnovers. That all changed in the 18th minute when Orlando broke the deadlock through an unlikely source. The Lions managed to break New York’s press, and Cartagena took advantage of an out-of-position John Tolkin to play Angulo behind the defense with a great ball. The Colombian carried the ball into the box, cut onto his left foot to avoid the sliding challenge of Dylan Nealis, and beat goalkeeper Carlos Coronel to score his third goal of the season.

The Red Bulls had a great opportunity to tie the game in the 30th minute after a bad Pereyra giveaway at midfield, but Luquinhas hit a tame shot at Gallese and failed to capitalize. Smith of all people had a crack at goal from inside the box just a few minutes before halftime, but he sent his effort wide of the post when he really should have hit the target. Tom Barlow then wasted another chance to put the game at 1-1 going into halftime but contrived to fire over the bar from the top of the area when all he had to do was hit the empty net.

That proved to be the last action of the half, and it was surprising to see Orlando in the lead based on the stats. Orlando held slightly more possession (52.1%-47.9%) and passed marginally better (76.1%-74.9%) but those were the only categories in which it led. The Lions were outshot (7-2), had fewer shots on goal (2-1), and took no corner kicks while the Red Bulls had one.

Fortunately, the Lions got a break just a couple minutes into the second half. Kara ran onto a ball over the top and New York center back Andres Reyes pulled him back, picked up a deserved second yellow card, and hit the showers early in the 47th minute.

New York cleared the danger from the ensuing free kick, but referee Victor Rivas was advised to go to the monitor and check for a foul during the play. Further examination revealed that Sean Nealis took Jansson down from behind as the ball was in the air, and he rightfully pointed to the spot. Enter Torres, who stepped up and beat Coronel (who guessed the right way), to double Orlando’s advantage despite the Paraguayan trying to get in his head beforehand.

The good vibes were dented slightly when Araujo went down injured in the 57th minute, with Felipe coming on in his place. The Red Bulls kept up their traditional high pressing despite being down a man, and with the Lions continuing to be sloppy in possession, it was hard to blame them. The teams traded chances right after Araujo made his exit, and some close calls for New York spurred Pareja into further changes, with Duncan McGuire and Martin Ojeda entering the fray for Kara and Pereyra in the 62nd minute.

Angulo squeezed off a shot from an acute angle three minutes later and Coronel saved it well, with the game entering a bit of a lull after he did so as the teams traded fouls and McGuire was caught offside.

Things sprang back into life in the 72nd minute. Ojeda cleared his lines and managed to find Angulo in the process, who absolutely torched Frankie Amaya down the left wing. The Colombian carried the ball into the box, drew Tolkin to him, and crossed perfectly for the unmarked Torres, who fired low and hard past Coronel with conviction to put the game away for good.

Despite being down 3-0, the Red Bulls kept up the fight and Jansson was forced into a good block just four minutes after Facu bagged his brace. The Lions spurned a few more half chances as the game wound down, and there was a scary moment in the 82nd minute when Dylan Nealis fell into Gallese’s leg, but the goalkeeper was able to soldier on after getting some treatment, although he looked a little shaky.

That more or less did it for the notable moments of action, as Orlando saw out a healthy eight minutes of stoppage time to make it five games unbeaten. The Lions finished with more possession (51.2%-48.8%) and more shots on target (5-2), but New York was crisper with its passing (79.2%-78%), took more shots (14-7), and won more corners (8-2).

David Rohe was on hand for our Player Grades column in this one, and Angulo took Man of the Match honors with an 8 out of 10 for his one-goal, one-assist performance that also included three completed dribbles, two tackles, and an interception. Torres unsurprisingly also graded out high with a 7.5 out of 10, as did Cartagena, who received the same grade.

The Lions went on to grab one more victory before the undefeated streak ended at six up in Foxborough against the New England Revolution. Fortunately, they started picking up points again immediately afterward and had a largely strong summer and back half of the year that saw them finish second in both the Eastern Conference and Supporters’ Shield race. Hopefully, this year’s side can take some cues from the 2023 squad and start stacking points with more regularity once the season resumes in July. Vamos Orlando!

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Lion Links

Lion Links: 6/5/26

Maxime Crepeau named Canada’s starter, analyzing Germany before USMNT friendly, USWNT prepares for Brazil, and more.

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2 days ago

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June 5, 2026

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Image of Maxime Crepeau making a save against the New York Red Bulls.
Dan MacDonald, The Mane Land

Happy Friday, Mane Landers! It’s been a pretty hectic week for me, but I’m looking forward to a weekend filled with soccer and celebrating with some friends. It should be a nice next couple of days before the World Cup is here in full force next week. Before we dive into today’s links, let’s all wish a happy birthday to Orlando City B midfielder Dylan Judelson!

Canada Chooses Maxime Crepeau as Starting Goalkeeper

Orlando City goalkeeper Maxime Crepeau was named as the starter for Canada for the upcoming World Cup. The 32-year-old has been in a tight battle with Dayne St. Clair for the starting job for quite some time and he’s done well enough for Jesse Marsch to choose him for the role. This will be Crepeau’s first World Cup since he wasn’t able to take part in the 2022 competition due to a broken leg. Canada will play Ireland today in a friendly before hosting Bosnia and Herzegovina in the World Cup on June 12.

Analyzing Germany Ahead of USMNT Clash

The United States Men’s National Team will take on Germany on Saturday in Chicago in its final friendly before the World Cup starts next week. This will be the 13th match between the two nations, with the most recent one being a 3-1 loss by the U.S. in October of 2023. Manuel Neuer is Germany’s starting goalkeeper, but he’s dealing with an injury and backup Oliver Baumann could play on Saturday in his place. Hopefully the U.S. can make his life difficult, but Germany has tough defenders in Jonathan Tah and Nico Schlotterbeck. Florian Wirtz, Kai Havertz, and Leroy Sane are dangerous attacking threats, while Nick Woltemade brings both height and solid ball movement at the top of the formation. It should be a great test for the USMNT before the games get serious.

USWNT Prepares for Brazil

The United States Women’s National Team is in action on Saturday as well, with the team set to play Brazil in Sao Paulo in the first of two friendlies. Plenty of attention will be on the reunited attacking trio of Sophia Wilson, Trinity Rodman, and Mallory Swanson that combined for 10 goals and five assists in the 2024 Summer Olympics. As for Brazil, the Orlando Pride are well represented, with Marta, Angelina, and Rafaelle all called up for these friendlies. There’s plenty of competing talent on Brazil’s roster, so it will be interesting to see who starts on Saturday. I’m most interested to see how the U.S. defense manages against Brazilian attackers like Ludmila, Dudinha, and Kerolin without having Naomi Girma on the back line.

Liverpool Hires Andoni Iraola as Next Manager

Liverpool didn’t waste much time finding a new manager after firing Arne Slot last week, hiring Andoni Iraola as his replacement. Iraola joins Liverpool after three years with Bournemouth that included securing Europa League qualification for the first time in club history this past season. He now joins a Liverpool team that qualified for the Champions League, but lost 12 league games after winning the league title in 2025. It will be interesting to see how Iraola does at one of England’s biggest clubs, particularly in regards to how his high-octane approach is applied.

Free Kicks

  • While the Pride haven’t provided an injury update on Barbra Banda according to reporter Jeff Kassouf, she did reportedly travel for Zambia’s friendlies against Kenya and Burkina Faso as the team prepares for next month’s Women’s Africa Cup of Nations tournament.

I checked in with the Orlando Pride: no official update on Barbra Banda after sustaining an injury over the weekend in #NWSL play. A spokesperson confirmed that Banda did travel to join Zambia for international duty. Hopefully more answers soon. No NWSL games until July 3.

— Jeff Kassouf (@jeffkassouf.bsky.social) 2026-06-04T19:11:37.433Z

That’s all I have for you this time around. I hope you all have a fantastical Friday and rest of your weekend!

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Orlando City

According to Math, Orlando Among Top Soccering Cities in North America In 2026

A ranking of every North American city by its soccer performances thus far in 2026.

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3 days ago

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June 4, 2026

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An aerial image of Inter&Co Stadium
Image courtesy of Orlando City SC

The opening match of the 2026 FIFA Men’s World Cup kicks off one week from today, when Mexico hosts South Africa at Estadio Azteca Mexico City Stadium (thanks FIFA, for your silly stadium-naming policy). Like most soccer fans, I am excited for wall-to-wall games starting next week, but I will definitely also be missing the men and women in purple as Orlando City and the Orlando Pride will not play again until early July (Pride) and late July (Orlando City).

MLS NEXT Pro channeled its inner Red Hot Chili Peppers and said they “can’t stop, they’re addicted to the shindig” and will continue to play a normal weekly schedule throughout the World Cup, so thankfully we will still have the Young Lions to root for during this break. But aside from that, it will be all international soccer for the upcoming weeks, and primarily in North America.

With that in mind, I took a deeper look at the beautiful game on our beautiful continent and evaluated which cities in North America are having the best soccer-related 2026 so far. There are no actual rankings for this, so I created my own, using the following components:

  • I awarded a half point to the city of every team in Liga MX, Liga MX Femenil, Major League Soccer (MLS), NWSL, and the Northern Super League (Canada’s top domestic women’s league). This covers the highest levels of club competition on the continent. I did not include the Canadian Premier League (men’s, ranked 159th among men’s leagues by Opta) or the Gainbridge Super League (women’s, ranked 35th among women’s leagues), because even though those are considered leagues at the highest level of competition in their countries, they do not compare to the five leagues I included. Also, Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver all have teams in MLS.
  • I awarded a full point to every city that is hosting World Cup games. This is a little sticky because some stadiums and/or teams represent metropolitan areas as opposed to the actual zip/area code location for the team or stadium, but I did some rounding. I had to put my mathematics degree to good use.
  • I averaged the points earned per match per team in that city, and awarded that total number of points to the city. Orlando, for example, received 1.18 points in this category, as Orlando City is averaging 0.93 (this was disappointing to type) and the Pride are averaging 1.42.
  • I awarded a point to the city of each quarterfinalist in the 2026 Concacaf Champions Cup and U.S. Open Cup, and a subsequent point for each win by those teams.
  • I awarded a point to the city of each semifinalist in the 2026 Concacaf W Champions Cup (this tournament went straight to the semifinals after the group stage), and a subsequent point for each win by those teams, excluding the third-place game.

After I awarded all those points, I rested for a minute, and then I summed up all the points for each city to see which cities are having the best 2026 so far (there are 47 North American cities/metro areas with at least one team in the leagues I included).

As this is an Orlando-focused publication, let’s take a look at the City Beautiful and how we fared. There are two professional teams in Orlando that count, so a half point for Orlando City plus a half point for the Pride accounted for one total point. With how well OCB has been playing (fourth in the Eastern Conference and winners of three of its last four games), I wish I could have included MLS NEXT Pro teams in the points system, but including that league did not make sense.

OCB would have helped with the average points metric as well, as it is averaging 1.83 points per match, the best in Orlando. Restricting it down to Orlando City and the Pride, however, added the 1.18 points that I referenced in the bullets earlier.

The Lions are in the U.S. Open Cup semifinals, which earned them one point for being a quarterfinalist and another point for winning that quarterfinal match, so they picked up two points from the U.S. Open Cup.

Orlando was not selected to be a host city for any World Cup games, Orlando City did not qualify for this year’s Concacaf Champions Cup, and the Pride nearly qualified for the semifinals of the Concacaf W Champions Cup but fell just short (ugh, because they really should have advanced), so Orlando did not pick up any points from any of those three categories.

With the points that Orlando accumulated it has tallied a total of 4.18 points so far in 2026. Let’s take a look at where 4.18 puts Orlando in the city rankings:

Chart showing all North American cities in the study and its score, organized alphabetically.

The cities in the chart above are sorted alphabetically, for ease of finding any cities you are interested in picking out, but the chart below shows the same data but sorted from most to fewest points earned:

Chart showing all North American cities in the study and its score, organized by score, showing Orlando in 13th.

In looking at this chart, you will find Orlando just outside the top 10, sitting in the lucky number 13 spot. Unsurprisingly, most of the teams at the top are among the largest cities on the continent and were also selected to be World Cup host cities. Among cities not selected as host cities, and therefore cities that did not receive a one-point bump in my rubric, Orlando ranked fifth, trailing Toluca (Mexico), Nashville, Washington D.C., and Denver.

If the Pride had played a little better in the Concacaf W Champions Cup, and had Barbra Banda not gotten injured and missed the entire group stage last summer, Orlando likely would have qualified for at least the semifinals in that cup and finished in the top six, or perhaps even higher, of these rankings.

It should come as no surprise to soccer fans that Mexican cities dominate the top of this ranking system, as Mexico City boasts a continent-high six teams (men’s and women’s heavyweights Club América, Cruz Azul, and Pumas), Monterrey houses four (men’s and women’s for Tigres and Monterrey), and Toluca, which only has men’s and women’s teams called Toluca but is the reigning Concacaf men’s champion after defeating Tigres on May 30.

With Miami to the south and Atlanta to the north, it was always unlikely that Orlando was going to be selected as a host city, but based on performance alone, our city is among the top soccer cities on the continent this year. And this is even with Orlando City having a down year during league play in 2026 and the Pride only recently putting together some decent results.

Last year, through 15 games Orlando City was nearly one full point better, averaging 1.80 points per game compared to this year’s 0.93, and the 2025 Pride were two-thirds of a point better than this year’s team through their first 12 games, averaging 2.08 points per game last year compared to 1.42 in 2026.

That was then and this is now, and neither season ended the way Orlando City or the Pride wanted in 2025, so hopefully the slower starts portend something better for this year’s teams. There is still a U.S. Open Cup, Leagues Cup, and MLS playoff spot for Orlando City to play for when its season resumes, and the Pride can solidify, or preferably, improve their playoff spot as well.

As we get closer to the end of 2026 I will update this chart to see where Orlando finishes in the full-year rankings, but for now we once again have unimpeachable evidence that shows that Orlando is the soccer capital of the southeast. We have all known this for years and years, but it is important to remind the people of Atlanta and Miami about it from time to time.

This was that time.

Vamos Orlando!

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