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

Orlando City was taken behind the woodshed on Saturday night (there are definitely woodsheds in Tennessee, and Orlando City players will be able to describe one near Geodis Park in intimate detail), as they were flogged 5-0 by a rampant Nashville SC squad. There were not a lot of positives to take away from this game, but a lot of young players were forced to play due to injuries, so hopefully those minutes will pay off down the road. Thankfully, there is no relegation to worry about in Major League Soccer, and the Lions now have nearly two weeks until their next game to regroup and get on the same page.

I have my purple pen out but I am going with the red one again, so here we go. Let’s take a look at how Orlando City’s players rated individually in an Eastern Conference matchup.

Starters

GK, Maxime Crépeau, 5.5 — Crépeau went the full 90 minutes on Saturday night, but he may wish that he had been red carded again after facing wave after wave of Nashville attackers all evening. The Canadian was badly beaten for Nashville’s first goal, a Cristian Espinoza cross that was mis-hit and turned into a shot that beat Crépeau where you never want to be beaten as a goalkeeper — at the near post. Aside from that shot, Crépeau was basically hung out to dry by the “defense” in front of him, as he had little to no chance to save any of the other four goals that Nashville put into the back of his net. He made four saves on the night, with another two coming after offside calls so they were not counted in the stats. He completed 64.7% of his passes, including all of his short passes, and if not for some big saves, Orlando City could have set a club record for goals allowed with how poorly the team played defensively.

D, Adrián Marín, 4.5 — The Spaniard was ineffective on both sides of the ball on Saturday night, with his best contributions coming on loose ball recoveries (6) and clearances (3). He brought little to the attack, completing only 70.6% of his passes and most of those were the short or backwards variety. He completed one long ball and did not have any crosses, and even though Nashville made 48% of its attacks up his side of the field, he only had one tackle and one interception. It was not a surprise when he came off in the 59th minute, and he will need to improve his play in future weeks if he wants to hold down the starting left back spot.

D, Iago, 4.5 — Nashville dominated possession, took nearly 20 shots, scored five goals, and despite playing the full 90 minutes, Iago did not make a tackle and had his only defensive contributions as one interception and six clearances. It is clear that the big Brazilian defender is skilled and has a lot of potential, but he is too tentative and slow with his decision making right now on the field as he adapts to playing against veteran professionals instead of mostly youth players. With all the injuries Orlando City is dealing with, he is going to have to continue this trial by fire, and he was burned badly against Nashville. He completed a team-high 54 passes at a 90% completion rate, but aside from that it was a difficult night.

D, Nolan Miller, 4.5 — Miller’s evening was not much better than his center back partner’s, and arguably was worse as he directly created Nashville’s second goal with a silly shirt pull in the box that led to a penalty kick. The MLS SuperDraft pick made one tackle and logged four clearances while completing 87.5% of his passes, but the shirt pull and a lack of communication with Griffin Dorsey that led to both defenders playing the same man while leaving Sam Surridge (the league’s leading scorer) wide open will be brutal reminders of the difference between playing defense at the MLS level vs. the NCAA level. He left a clear path for Cristian Espinoza’s easy assist on Surridge’s third goal as well, closing on the man with the ball, who Iago was already tracking. Mistakes led to two goals, on a rough night for the young center back.

D, Griffin Dorsey, 5.5 — Dorsey’s best contribution on the night might have been the fire he showed in the post-game interviews (you can read his spicy comments in our game recap), but on the field he was also one of the top performers for Orlando City. He nearly scored a great goal after been put in by Duncan McGuire, but his shot hit the left post and came back into play. The right back made several driving runs up the field to try to create some attacks, but the partnership with Marco Pašalić still is not there, and no major chances came from those runs. On the defensive side, Dorsey had a game-leading four tackles while adding one interception and one block, and he completed 64.5% of his passes before coming off in the second half for Yutaro Tsukada.

MF, Iván Angulo, 6 (MotM) — The Colombian gave the best among a set of mediocre-to-decent performances, earning my Man of the Match for this game. His speed created several chances up the left side of the field, and his left-footed shot attempt in the first half was one of the best shots Orlando City took all game. After Orlando City made some subs he flipped over to the right side of the field as a wingback, and nearly had an assist on a great pass to Tiago, but the Brazilian was just barely offside. Angulo recorded two tackles and one interception on defense, and went the full 90 at full speed, even though by the game was far out of reach by the end. He completed 88.6% of his passes, including one key pass, and gave one of the few performances that looked like that of the Lions from the last few seasons.

MF, Braian Ojeda, 5.5 — Defensive Ojeda once again delivered a strong work rate, but aside from his hustle there was very little that stood out about his play. He completed 86.7% of his passes, including one key pass, and stuffed the defensive stat sheet with one tackle, three interceptions, one block, and one clearance. Nashville overran Orlando City’s defense whenever it wanted, however, and despite the hustle and work rate from Ojeda and the other midfielders and defenders, Nashville had 58% of the possession and it really felt like a lot more. Ojeda has not been able to develop any chemistry with his midfield partners because they keep changing every game, and until that can change Orlando City will be at risk of more games like Saturday’s, with Ojeda just in chase mode for his entire time on the field.

MF, Luis Otávio, 4.5 — Perhaps it is bad luck or perhaps it is that he has only started on the road against strong opponents, but in both of Otávio’s starts he has shown only flashes of potential and mostly seems to not be on the same page with his midfield partner or with the defenders he is supposed to be shielding as a defensive midfielder. The Brazilian completed 10 passes at a 66.7% completion rate and added one clearance during his 45 minutes, and even though Orlando City only gave up two goals while he was on the field and three while Colin Guske was on the field, the Lions looked much better with Guske than they did with Otávio. He nearly compounded the issues by picking up a card, as the referee had to stop the game to deliver him a stern talking to, and it was not a surprise to see him be substituted for the second half, especially after a terrible giveaway that nearly led to a goal during first-half stoppage time.

MF, Marco Pašalić, 5.5 — The Croatian was engaged and active, and nearly put one away early in the second half that could have cut the score to 2-1. It was partially blocked and went out for a corner, and a few minutes later, Surridge scored again and the Lions never were in the game again. Losing Alex Freeman certainly hurt, but the double whammy is that even though Dorsey has been pretty good, he has not been Freeman, and he and Pašalić have yet to figure out a symbiotic partnership, so Pašalić is struggling to contribute as well. The effort was definitely there even though the final product was not, and the Croatian was among the few somewhat bright spots on a dreary night. He completed 80.7% of his passes with one key pass and logged two interceptions and one clearance on defense while going the full 90 minutes for the first time this season.

F, Martín Ojeda, 5.5 — Saturday night was one of Ojeda’s poorest performances in a while, and even though the stat sheet shows that he completed 83.7% of his passes with three key passes, it did not feel like he had any real influence on the game. Both shots he took were off target, and while one would have been a spectacular goal off a bouncing ball, the other was on a free kick, and the Argentinean just did not aim it well enough and put it several feet wide. Even when he is playing poorly the offense generally runs through Ojeda, and it did against Nashville as well, but it is not a coincidence that a quiet and inconspicuous Ojeda led to a mostly quiet and inconspicuous offensive evening for the Lions.

F, Duncan McGuire, 5.5 — McGuire finally got a little bit of service on Saturday but he could not convert his one big chance, going high with his shot and putting it right into the hands of Brian Schwake. It was not a clear breakaway, but Big Dunc still could have done better with his shot, and had that gone in, the whole complexion of the game could have changed. McGuire also played a great pass to Dorsey to set up his shot that rocketed off the post, so while he had a goose egg on goal contributions, he was involved in some of the best chances that Orlando City had. In the end there were not enough chances and they did not convert the ones they had, and McGuire came off for Tiago for the final third of the game. He completed 92.9% of his pass attempts, with one key pass, put his one shot attempt on target, and did not have any defensive contributions.

Substitutes

MF, Colin Guske (46′), 5.5 — Guske did not play an outstanding half, but he played better than Otávio after coming on for him after halftime. We do not know what was asked of the two center midfielders by the coaching staff, but Guske held down the middle of the field better than the Brazilian did and was much more active when the Lions were in possession, completing 26 passes at an 89.7% completion rate to his counterpart’s 10 passes at 66.7%. The young midfielder perhaps could have dropped deeper and thwarted Nashville’s third goal, which happened a few feet in front of him, but that goal was not on him and neither were the other two scored by the home team while Guske was on the field.

D, Zakaria Taifi, (59′), 5.5 — The Homegrown defender came on for Marín with 31 minutes to go, and had a chance to show his abilities at left back for the first time this season. Taifi was active during his shift, completing 88.9% of his passes and making more threatening runs than Marín did during his time on the field, but he also was responsible for the turnover that led to Nashville’s fourth goal, when he was a little slow to corral a loose ball and then was muscled off the ball by Espinoza, who then made a driving run that led to a Nashville goal. I thought Taifi’s performance was decent overall, both offensively and defensively (one tackle, one excellent block, and one clearance) and after two straight good shifts off the bench he will be in serious contention to get a start for the Lions in their next game.

F, Tiago, (59′), 5.5 — The young Brazilian came on for McGuire, but he was not able to unlock Nashville’s defense either. He completed all six of his pass attempts and drew two fouls, but he could not get himself free to take any shots (aside from when he was offside, though that shot did go into the back of the net) and he did not create any good chances with his passes either. Orlando City’s offense created more chances with Tiago on than the field than with McGuire, but Nashville was also far ahead by that time and playing more of a prevent defense than playing with the same intensity as during the first two-thirds of the game.

MF, Yutaro Tsukada, (72′), 4.5 — Tsukada made his first appearance of the season and his first since 2024, completing all four of his pass attempts and attempting to create attacks with the ball every time he received it. He was only successful on one of his four one-on-one attempts but he brought some energy out on the left side of the field after coming on for Dorsey.

That’s how I saw the individual performances in Orlando City’s ugly 5-0 loss at Nashville. Let us know what you thought of the game in the comments below, and don’t forget to vote for your Man of the Match.