 Photo by Kim Klement/USA TODAY Sports
By IVES GALARCEP
Orlando City has enjoyed some of the best home support in MLS since making its debut as an expansion team back in March. Unfortunately for the Lions, they hadn’t been able to produce the results to match that impressive fan support.
That changed on Sunday, with Orlando City turning in an outstanding showing against an LA Galaxy side missing several starters. Brazilian star Kaka led the Lion’s biggest offensive outburst of the season, collecting a goal and an assist in Orlando City’s 4-0 win in front of 40,122 at the Citrus Bowl.
The victory was the first at home for Orlando City.
Playing without injured MLS MVP Robbie Keane, as well as U.S. Men’s National Team defender Omar Gonzalez, who missed the match with a knee injury, the Galaxy had no answer for Orlando City’s attack, which ran circles around the visitors from early on.
Eric Avila opened the scoring in the 12th minute when he capped a lengthy passing sequence with a header off a Brek Shea header pass.
Rookie Cyle Larin notched his fourth goal of the season in the 34th minute when he worked a combination with Kaka, who slotted in a pass to a wide open Larin, who finished easily past Jaime Penedo.
The second half offered little respite for the Galaxy, who managed just one shot on target in the entire match. Rather than find a way to claw back in, the Galaxy fell behind even more when Penedo fouled Kaka in the penalty area, drawing a penalty kick that Kaka converted in the 56th minute.
Darwin Ceren poured on Orlando City’s fourth goal in the 73rd minute when he took a speculative shot from 30 yards out that took a deflection before rolling past Penedo to make the score 4-0.
The four-goal rout marked the largest margin of victory in MLS history by an expansion team against a defending MLS Cup champion.
The win snapped Orlando City’s four-match winless streak, while the Galaxy are now mired in a five-match winless skid.
Orlando City travels to San Jose on Saturday to take on the Earthquakes, while the Galaxy will look to regroup when they return home on Friday to face the Houston Dynamo.
This is why I was so stunned a few weeks ago when the SBI staff had LAG as #1 in their power rankings. I said it then and I will say it again: you can practically still see Landon in the skeleton of this club. It will take a long time to reshape the team. Just a handful of injuries make it one of the worst in the league. I say this as a 20 season fan of LA.
Yeah, they have been overvalued by way too many of the media all year long. They are not going to replace Landon, even by buying a guy who used to be good.
Plus with OG, which makes a huge difference, they are still a run of the mill team in a very competitive league.
How smooth was Kaka as he glided by the sliding LA defender on Orlando’s second goal?
Any thoughts on Sebastian Llegett? He got twenty minutes. Nothing?
I was at the game, and was hoping Llegett would get some minutes and finally see what the fuss was about. He came in with 20 minutes to go and, let’s just say, he didn’t shine. He looked very rusty/nervous. Not a big surprise, considering he hasn’t played much. But it seemed like even simple passes were iffy at best.
I guess we know why Omar gets the DP bucks.
Did you guys notice the lazer pointers being pointed at Penedo’s face throughout the whole game by the Orlando fans? So much for the “disgraceful Mexican fans”narrative many on this site love to have. Proof that there are disrespectful/disgraceful fans in every country, in every city.
them fans could be mexican Orlando fans…. just saying..
The America keeper got them bad during the CCL final. I doubt that was the Mexicans doing it.
I saw a lot of “classless” comments when it happened during the CCL game. Yesterday the comments were more “some moron in the crowd”
ya I noticed the difference in how people talked about it too
Mexico fans are generally classless (and there’s nothing wrong with saying so) and so are others who adopt their tactics.
Galaxy are not the same no more and I dont think gerrard has the game to help galaxy rebound this season.
For those who think galaxy need keane to win, their wrong. Keane is not the same and he will be injured on and off and gonzalez is overrated. Gonzalez, became a DP just incase a European would buy him and galaxy had to raise his price and galaxy might now want to lower his salary 🙂
So if you ask me, how about galaxy renegotiate Keanes and gonzalez dp salary and get 2 new dps with Gerrard.
Just give keane and gonzalez free rent and winning bonuses.
Galaxy have the power to get any dp they want, imagine getting mexico javier and Prince botoeng
We watched Tommy Meyer get shelled time and again today…and we’re questioning how valuable Omar Gonzalez is?
No, LA Galaxy are not the same team…without 1) Donovan or his nominal replacement, Stephen Gerrard, 2) Keane 3) Gonzalez 4) Sarvas and 5) Robbie Rodgers. They are not the same team, 2,000+ miles from home, as few teams are.
If I’m Bruce Arena, am I yelling at the guys that are remaining after this showing? Nope. I very much doubt Arena is, either. There’s about $12+ million in salary – about four times what the rest of the team is collectively getting – that isn’t on the field for them right now. Such is life, in MLS. How good would, say, Seattle look if you took away Dempsey, Martins, Chad Martin, and maybe Osvaldo Alonso, and forced the remaining team to carry the day, in, say, Boston? Because that’s exactly the situation LA was playing in today.
Great win for Orlando and I’m sure it’ll go a long ways to making their fan base feel good and building confidence for the squad, but that was also the most shorthanded LA Galaxy team you’ll ever see, playing three times zones away from home.
You can’t really take much away from that, other than that Orlando, at home, with Kaka and Brek Shea, is better than LA without any DP’s and a couple of core guys from last year as well. One of the downsides of the MLS salary cap – you get situations like this from time to time, where pretty much all you can do is die ugly.
Absolute horrible game by The Galaxy.
the Galaxy played with a quilt of their team, a mishmash lineup , but even so, the Galaxy stink right now, as bad as they’ve been in 5 years, maybe more. no easy answers either as it’s the midfield where the issues are. Juninho needs some help in there, and the injuries mentioned hurt, but more so when added to the continued pain the Galaxy are feeling from the voids left by LD and Sarvas in midfield. Zardes a nice player but he’s now the focus of the opponents’ D instead of it being Keane or LD and he has not risen to that occassion…yet
My son and I were watching LAG’s warm ups and we couldn’t figure out who several of the starters until the teams were announced. This was definitely a patchwork of players. The only player that did himself any favors was Juninho. Everybody else was poor. Yes, Keane is getting old and Gerrard will take time to integrate, but I’m hopeful they can turn things around. Arena certainly has a track record for doing that.
Your recap leaves much to be desired. The first goal was absolute class. A slick pass by Kaka for Ramos to send across. Shea rose to meet it on the back post and while everyone thought he would head it on goal, he deftly headed it back across for Avila to head past the motionless Pineda. I was there- as I have been for every Orlando game this season. That was one of the prettiest “team” goals you will see- with many members of the team building it up into the attack. It was a fun game to be at as it was pretty obvious it was going to be pretty wide open from the start. Both teams came out looking to attack and the fans certainly enjoyed the day. It was obvious Keane and Gonzalez being out really hurt the Galaxy (and no Robbie Rogers either). But there was still a lot of class on the field for the Galaxy and for them to get run out of that stadium was just fantastic to see. Kaka earned a yellow after his PK for a very touching tribute to Kevin Molino (who went out for the season with a torn ACL). Kaka ran to the bench and out on a Molino jersey and pointed to his back after the goal. What a leader. The fans on hand loved it and I’m sure it went a long way with his teammates. It was also nice to see the Orlando debut for Tally Hall. While he didn’t have to do much, there was a noticeable difference. He was much more composed when he had the ball- mostly playing it short and keeping possession instead of just kicking it down the field. And he seemed to organize the back line much better. They limited LA to ONE shot on goal the ENTIRE game (and it was in the 88th minute). This could be the turning point for this franchise for the season. And if the owner ponies up for another DP- watch out! This young team is starting to get their legs under them. Fun to watch!
This is a great site and if you don’t like the recap there are plenty of others available on the internet. Sorry Ives didn’t wax lyrical enough about your team finally winning a game.
Yeah, but that first goal really was nice.
“But there was still a lot of class on the field for the Galaxy”
Well, this just isn’t true.