Four questions on Orlando City with The Mane Land

I caught up with Ben Miller of The Mane Land to get updates on Orlando City in their return visit to face the Philadelphia Union tonight at Subaru Park. He has questions he asked me published on The Mane Land.

Orlando has largely been very effective going forward and shaky at the back The Lions lead the league with 15 goals scored, so they haven’t had any trouble scoring, with the only time they were held under 2 goals coming in the shoebox-like confines of Yankee Stadium. The problems have come in defense. While we haven’t seen the comedy of errors that took place on opening night, the defense has been uncharacteristically leaky for an Oscar Pareja coached side. OCSC has only held teams under two goals twice, and has yet to keep a clean sheet. This is a team that shows promise, but if it’s going to take the next step then the back line needs to be sorted out.

The Designated Players have been worth every penny, which isn’t something we always saw last year. The now departed Facundo Torres was always reliable, and Martin Ojeda came on strong in the second half of the season after getting moved to the central no.10 role, but Luis Muriel looks like a completely different player than he did in 2024. There were plenty of brilliant moments in flashes, but he seems to have really benefited from having a full offseason under his belt and a year to figure out how the league works. In the last two games the defense has looked better, and that’s helped too, particularly in the tight 2-1 win over the LA Galaxy.

There’s also been the emergence of Alex Freeman at right back. He came into the season opener against the Union with about a half-hour left to play, put in a pretty good performance, and promptly took the starting job from a very capable Dagur Dan Thorhallsson and never looked back. He has a combination of size, speed, and dribbling ability that make him a real threat when coming forward, and it’s no accident that he has two goals and an assist to his name already. He gives Orlando a different dimension when allowed to go forward, and has made it impossible for Pareja to drop him.

He’s looked pretty good for the most part. Some games have been more effective than others, but he’s been a good addition so far. His preference to run at the opposition and be direct has been a nice complement to Muriel, who can play as a target man or drop deep to help facilitate play, and Ojeda who is a great passer and good at finding space, but doesn’t typically take guys on with his dribbling. The three of them have formed a free-scoring trio so far, and they have Orlando top of the goalscoring charts which is just such a weird sentence to type. I still harbor concerns that someone as one-footed as he is will eventually get figured out by opposing teams, but for now he’s been a good fit.

Favian Loyola and Nico Rodriguez are both out with thigh injuries, but everyone else should be good to go.

Projected Starting XI: Pedro Gallese; Rafael Santos, Rodrigo Schlegel, Robin Jansson, Alex Freeman; Cesar Araujo, Eduard Atuesta, Ivan Angulo, Martin Ojeda, Marco Pasalic; Luis Muriel.

This feels like a tight game to me, with Orlando’s leaky defense rearing its head once again. 2-2.