One final game remains in the 2026 Major League Soccer regular season, and Orlando has a chance to finish as high as seventh in the Eastern Conference if it both wins its game and gets help from the two teams above it in the standings. Beyond what happens in other matchups though, the Lions first need to do their part and take care of business against the New England Revolution.

A visit from the Revs means I spoke to Jake Catanese, one of the writers for The Blazing Musket. As always, he did a great job at catching us up on how things are going for New England, and we appreciate his help. I also answered some of his questions about Orlando City, which you can find over at their place.

The Revs had a couple blips after beating Orlando in the form of back-to-back 3-0 losses to Real Salt Lake and the Seattle Sounders, but otherwise it’s been pretty smooth sailing to end the season. Did you see anything in those two games that could prove to be an issue come playoff time?

Jake Catanese: So for context, the Revs lost at RSL and then at home to Seattle on either side of the international break a month ago and New England had just gotten the injury news for both Jack Harrison and Alhassan Yusuf more or less being done for the regular season. So the lineup choice here was a little wonky but nothing the Revs hadn’t already dealt with throughout the year. However, both games played out in a similar fashion — New England went down early and never really recovered and then gave up two goals late to just put a really bad taste in everyone’s mouth.

Not that the Revs played badly in either game, the 3-0 scorelines were a little unfair in my opinion, but if there was a blueprint to contain New England I think that would be it. The Revs can be very good at a lot of things, but breaking down a packed in and organized defense is rarely going to be one of them and has been for a while regardless of coaching regime, and scoring early allows teams to sit back and catch the Revs with their fullbacks up and get really great counter opportunities. It’s not so much an issue the Revs can solve per se, but it is a game state situation I can absolutely see happening again if New England gives up an early goal in the playoffs.

You brought up the addition of Daniel Gazdag when we last spoke back in September. How has he been performing lately?

JC: I think overall my view on the Revs signing Gazdag hasn’t changed, but New England has really had to lean on him as a starting winger in Jack Harrison’s absence a few times. There’s been some mixed results there. We’ve all seen what Gazdag can do in the middle of the field, and having him out wide I think mutes his full potential and effectiveness, so I credit him for going out and doing a solid job that is not in his true wheelhouse. That said, he’s been a big help down the stretch with a pair of late game-winning goals against New York City FC back in September and the Red Bulls more recently. His opener against Miami highlighted his qualities as a more central/second striker type and maybe we see more of that in the playoffs, because he would be a tremendous super sub off the bench late in games. I think it was still a great pickup for New England for the long term and it’s going to pay dividends during the (2027) Sprint Season for sure.

What do you think this team’s ceiling is when it comes to the postseason? If you had to identify a potential fatal flaw, what would it be?

JC: I think that the New England Revolution can hang with anyone in the East; that includes a Nashville team that whooped us twice like half a year ago because the schedule makers are bad at their jobs. The fatal flaw for the Revs is I don’t think we’ve seen their potential best lineup at any point this season due to injuries, so we have no idea if they can throw it together and make it work in a couple of weeks to run the gauntlet that is the MLS Cup playoffs. I think a first-round series win would cap off a tremendous turnaround for the only team in the East that missed the playoffs in 2025 to qualify in 2026 and really springboard this team into the Sprint Season and beyond. At this point, I am enjoying the ride and will continue to enjoy the ride because these Revs aren’t operating at their full potential yet…but they might be very soon and that’s very, very bad news for everyone else.

Will any players be unavailable due to injury, suspension, etc.? What is your projected starting XI and score prediction?

JC: The only change is Jackson Yueill in for Matt Polster in the central midfield, and we could see Mamadou Fofana in central defense, but he did not look good off the bench in Miami, so Marko Mitrovic might opt to run out the same lineup as a week ago. We might see Alhassan Yusuf in some capacity in this one as he was listed as questionable heading into last week’s game against Miami. With an outside shot at moving up into the No. 2 seed, I don’t think I’d risk him, but maybe some substitute minutes can help shake off some rust before the international break. Jack Harrison and Leo Campana remain out.

4-2-3-1: Matt Turner; Will Sands, Joshua Wynder, Ethan Kohler, Ilay Feingold; Brooklyn Raines, Jackson Yueill; Daniel Gazdag, Carles Gil, Peyton Miller; Dor Turgeman.

New England has been far from a dominant team, but Orlando likes to leak goals. I think the Revs take this 2-1.

Thanks again to Jake for his excellent primer on the Revolution. Vamos Orlando!

Good morning, Mane Landers. It’s Friday and I feel fine. Probably because I’m off today and actually have an entire weekend off work, which is really rare for me. I’ll be riding in a Gravel bike race and seeing Hamilton all in the same day. What a long, strange trip it will be. Sadly, I won’t be able to make the match on Saturday due to these events, but that doesn’t mean you can’t go to the stadium. I’ll feel better knowing you’re there. Now, let’s get to the links.

Orlando City’s Day of Decision

Orlando City hosts the New England Revolution on Decision Day at Inter.co Stadium. The Lions have a chance to move back up to seventh in the Eastern Conference and out of the play-in match if they defeat the Revolution and get a little help from the teams above them in the standings. To be fair, it’s pretty astounding that Orlando City even made the playoffs, given how the season started, but adding Antoine Griezmann will do wonders for a struggling club. Here are the scenarios for all the Eastern Conference teams.

Ellis Climbs the Ranks

Justin Ellis is one of the young players making a name for himself on the USMNT. His stock has risen due to his performances for both club and country. While Ellis is poised to get more playing time, other older players may see less of the field as these younger players see more minutes. In fact, Ricardo Pepi was not called up for the roster, although it is in part to recover fully from a knock.

Orlando Pride Needs Abound

With the off-season kicking off for the Orlando Pride, there are plenty of questions to address if the club is to get back to 2024 levels. Obviously, Barbra Banda is the foundation, though Haley McCutcheon is also a player that can be foundational. In fact, McCutcheon is now the youngest player to reach 15,000 regular-season minutes in NWSL history. The Orlando Pride defensive midfielder is 30 years old.

Of course, we’ll be waiting for a coaching decision before most of these needs can be addressed.

Women’s Soccer Roundup

ACL injuries are too common in women’s soccer and the FA and WSL have launched a research project into why they happen and how to reduce them. Sadly, female players are two to six times more likely to suffer the injury than male players. Elsewhere, FIFA is in talks about restricting Olympic squads to U-23 players. Finally, as the NWSL playoffs approach, we take a look at how the teams that made it stack up.

Free Kicks

• Portugal legend Cristiano Ronaldo is retiring from international football. He is doing the honorable thing by returning the number seven for the next generation.
• Angel City FC has signed 17-year-old U.S. U-17 Youth National Team star forward Maddie DiMaria through 2030. DiMaria is the type of young talent that the Orlando Pride should be trying to find.

• Kohzo Tashima intends to run for FIFA president, challenging Gianni Infantino for the position.

• Concacaf is revamping the Gold Cup. The big change is that the group stage will now feature two eight-team groups instead of four groups of four.

That will do it for today. Check back as we get your ready for Orlando City’s match this weekend. Vamos Orlando!

Thanks to a big win over the weekend, Orlando City has qualified for the 2026 playoffs, marking the seventh consecutive season that the club will play in the MLS postseason. Of course, that big weekend win did not come from the Lions; rather, it was a win by Nashville, a team that is excellent at both offense and defense (wow, what a concept), that guaranteed Orlando City a spot in the playoffs. In the end, it does not matter how it happened, just that it happened, and so we can once again break out The Whispers’ “And the Beat Goes On,” as we will no longer need to whisper — careless, in the wind, to horses, or otherwise, about the chances of all three Orlando teams missing the playoffs.

While the Pride and Orlando City B are both already into their off-seasons, Orlando City is guaranteed to have at least two more games, with the regular-season finale on Decision Day Saturday and then at least one playoff game after that, depending on how the final seedings shake out. The Lions could finish as high as seventh or as low as ninth, and they do not control their own destiny for their seeding.

If Cincinnati loses, Columbus draws or loses, and Orlando City wins, the Lions jump to seventh and would play Inter Miami or New England in a three-game series. In any other scenario Orlando City will be in the play-in game, and could host or play on the road against Cincinnati or Columbus in a single-elimination game.

We will know the Eastern Conference playoff bracket and schedule in the early evening on Saturday and where Orlando City will be when it starts its playoff journey for the seventh consecutive season. That streak is the longest active streak in MLS, as the Lions have qualified for the playoffs in every season since 2020, or, as our The Mane Land PawedCast hosts Michael Citro and Dave Rohe noted on this week’s episode, in every season when Óscar Pareja began the season as the head coach.

*Three Western Conference playoff spots are still up for grabs, so the teams with asterisks could all add one to their tally or drop to/remain at zero depending on the results on Decision Day

The seven-year streak for the Lions not only leads MLS, but is one of the best across all of the major men’s sports in the U.S. Only eight of the 153 other teams in the five leagues listed below have a playoff streak at least as long as Orlando City’s, though while the Lions lead MLS, they do not hold the belt in the state of Florida, as the Tampa Bay Lightning are one season away from making the playoffs in 10 consecutive seasons.

The last time the Lions did not make the playoffs was back in 2019, the year that both Nani and Robin Jansson arrived in Orlando. That team finished 11th in the Eastern Conference, though it had a goal differential of -8, which was only half as bad as the 2026 team’s current goal differential of -16. Back then, we thought allowing 1.53 goals per game seemed like a lot. If the 2026 team could have managed to allow only that same amount per game, the current goal differential would be +11, which would be in the top quarter of the league. Ah, wishful thinking.

Instead, as Orlando City fans are well aware, this year’s team has allowed 78 goals in 33 regular-season games (2.37 per game) and will almost certainly go into the playoffs having allowed the most goals of any playoff team in league history. This chart below includes every team since the Lions joined MLS, and there is a clear and unsurprising trend as it relates to allowing goals and earning points:

For the math nerds (my hand is firmly raised), the correlation is -0.69. Math majors would say that means goals allowed per match explains roughly half (r² ≈ 0.48) of the variation in points per match. Normal people would say teams that concede more goals tend to earn fewer points. Especially when they concede goals LATE IN THE GAME, WHEN THEY ARE WINNING, TURNING WINS INTO DRAWS!

I am sorry for the all caps, but that was cathartic. I do not feel even slightly better about the recently dropped points to Toronto, New York City FC, and Chicago, but at least I yelled angrily at my computer screen about it.

The 2026 Lions are a clear outlier on the chart above, as despite a brutal start to the season (seven losses in the first 10 games) and a profligate defense (third-worst goals-against average in league history and second-worst since they joined the league), they still have out-performed 41% of teams since 2015 in points earned per match. That is mostly because this year’s offense is in the 89th percentile in goals scored per match (1.88) since 2015 and with one goal scored will tie last year’s Lions for the most goals scored in club history, and with two or more scored will set a new club record.

If they can score six (stay with me, both Cincinnati and LAFC scored six on the Lions this season, so this is not completely unreasonable) on Saturday, they will get to an even 2.00 goals scored per game, something that has happened only 30 times in league history.

Whether the Lions win, lose, draw, get shut out, or score six (please, let them score six, if only to see Antoine Griezmann break out some kind of improvised six-shooter goal celebration), the playoff streak will extend through this season and be active when the 2027 sprint season starts in February. Finishing in the play-in game two years in a row would be disappointing, not to mention stressful, but championship runs can only happen after a team earns an invitation to the dance.

Where, hopefully for the Lions, the playoff beat will go on, everlasting.

Vamos Orlando!