DC United's unbeaten status in MLS this year came to a crashing halt on the road last night (March 22) as Orlando City FC beat them 4-1.
DC's starting lineup had a change, as Kyle Rowles was gone for international duty with Australia. Lukas McNaughton took his place. Matti Peltola was also unavailable, on international duty with Finland. Aaron Herrera was expected to be gone as well, but ended up not going on duty to Guatemala, and was at his usual right back position. Lineup:
Kim in goal
Schnegg, McNaughton, Bartlett, Herrera on defense
Enow, Kijima in defensive midfield
Peglow, Pirani, Stroud in midfield
Benteke at forward
Subs: Badji for Enow (53rd minute), Murrell for Peglow (63rd minute), Barajas for Kijima (79th minute), Dodson for Schnegg (79th minute), Zouhir for Stroud (79th minute).
DC started well, with Herrera getting a good shot on goal in the 4th minute, but Orlando has speed and a powerful offense (scoring 9 goals in their first 4 games) and they began to threaten. In the 21st minute, they broke through as Alexander Freeman drew everyone (including some who probably should not have gone) to the left side and crossed to Luis Muriel, who easily outjumped a lonely Herrera to head in Orlando's first goal. DC regrouped and maintained quite a bit of possession, and it seemed hopeful that they would get into halftime only down a goal. However, that hope evaporated in the 44th minute when Enow lost the ball at the top of DC's box. Orlando's Martin Ojeda pounced on it and scored with a shot that took an unfortunate deflection off Herrera. 2-0 Orlando at the half. DC had 51% of the possession, but was outshot 8-3.
Things got worse early in the second half. In the 50th minute, Freeman outjumped a stationary Enow (who may have been fouled) on a free kick for an unmarked header to make it 3-0. Six minutes later, Marco Pasalic hit a beautiful left-footed shot into the upper left corner from outside the box to stretch the lead to 4-0. Orlando could easily have had at least 2 more goals, but great saves from Kim and the post prevented further damage.
McNaughton headed home a goal in the first minute of stoppage time (assisted by Zouhir and Benteke) and DC had several other chances (and corners) at the very end, but the game ended 4-1.
DC ended up with 56% possession, 10 corner kicks, and 13 total shots (6 on goal) but the lopsided nature of the game (especially late) probably affected some of those statistics. Interestingly, Orlando only had 4 fouls called against them (vs 16 for DC).
DC's next game is vs the Columbus Crew on Saturday, March 29, at 730pm at Audi Field.
PS: I attended the Washington Spirit's home opener last night. Not a good result for them (2-0 loss) but I wanted to thank Kyle Staffieri with his help getting tickets.
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