Orlando City Opens New Stadium with Win


The Orlando City Lions Soccer Club christened their new stadium with a 1-0 win over NYCFC last Sunday, in the 2017 season opener for both clubs.

These two teams met in the opener of the 2015 season, when both were expansion teams. Orlando City coach Jason Kreis was on the opposite sideline that day, which ended in a 1-1 draw. Sunday’s game saw only one goal scored and that was enough to give Orlando City their first win in an opener on their third try.

“Extremely happy to give the fans something to be excited about,” said Kreis in his post-game press conference. This crowd was absolutely fantastic, this day was fantastic, the field was great. The level of work and commitment and togetherness by our team was off the charts.”

Cyle Larin scored in the 15th-minute, getting a nice feed from off a left-wing feed from Orlando new-comer signed Giles Barnes. That goal stood up, despite the NYCFC dominating possession for much of the game.

Barnes had just come in as a replacement for Kaká, who went down in a heap in the 11th-minute. He did walk to the sideline, but did so with a noticeable limp. It didn’t look good when it happened and it was confirmed this week that he suffered a hamstring injury and will likely be out six weeks, according to reports.

Kreis said after the game that he thought the injury looked like it could be a pretty serious injury and that he was disappointed for him. He ended up being correct.

Despite the injury, which obviously put a bit if a cloud over the victory, Orlando City got a big game out of their defense and goaltender Joe Bendik, who made seven saves, the same number of shots that his team took in total. NYCFC took 14 shots.

Kreis said a lot of mistakes were being made, but he said the team continued to fight. He also mentioned that if this was last year’s team, the result might have been different. Sunday, they “had positive reactions to the mistakes and were able to make plays.”

Bendik was also rewarded with the Save of the Week, thanks to fan voting on the Major League Soccer website.

For more info: NYCFC @ Orlando City Box Score

The Lions get an unexpected week off this week, as Saturday’s against the New England Revolution was postponed due to cold temperatures expected at game time. The match has been rescheduled for September 2, at 7:00 p.m.

The postponement means the next time the team takes the pitch, will be on March 18 at home, against the Philadelphia Union at 7:30 p.m.

**All quotes taken from post-game press conference on Orlando City website, which will be linked in all articles.


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