Orlando City 1 Newcastle United 0
Maybe it was the Orlando heat. Maybe it was the pitch . Maybe it was just a pre-season friendly. Whatever it was, it was quite simply an outstanding performance by Orlando City to beat their English Premiership opposition, Newcastle United tonight.
Truth be told, the scoreline didn’t do the game justice. Orlando were quite simply the better side and they out fought, out played and out gunned Newcastle. In short, they really should have won by more than a 1-0 scoreline.
Many arriving at the stadium tonight expected an easy Newcastle win and the locals were hoping the scoreline would be kept respectable as per the 3-1 loss to Bolton a week ago. Instead, they witnessed a performance to be proud of and Newcastle and their admirable fans will leave feeling very disappointed with their side’s performance.
The lead up to the game started among odd circumstances as staff at the Citrus Bowl worked long and hard through the night to rip up the expensive newly laid grass surface that Newcastle had previously demanded before the game. Normally the Citrus Bowl has an artificial surface and while Bolton were OK to play on it last week, Newcastle were not. At a cost of over $100,000, Orlando City officials made the decision to install the grass after the Bolton game but when United manager Alan Pardew saw the new surface yesterday he was far from impressed. Up came the grass and Newcastle then agreed to play on the original surface.
The game opened with Orlando on the ascendancy and Newcastle misplacing pass after pass . Orlando controlled the game and by the 25th minute had racked up 4 or 5 corners to nil from Newcastle. Slowly but surely Newcastle started to have more of the ball as the half went on but for all their approach play, they simply couldn’t find a way past a resolute Orlando defence.
The second half started in much the same way as the first half and around the hour mark, Orlando began to play with some real venom and began throwing everything they had at the men in black and white stripes. Twice they shaved a post as Max Griffin and Lewis Neal went close before Kevin Molino delivered the crucial blow in the 75th minute. It was a move created by Orlando’s Dennis Chin who rolled a neat ball to the oncoming Molino and he delivered a clinical finish into the right hand corner of the net.
Minutes later, it was almost 2-0 to Orlando as Molino again broke from the right only to see his shot saved, somewhat luckily, by Forster in the Newcastle net, who really didn’t seem to know what had happened as it hit his hand and flew away for a corner.
Newcastle were clearly provoked by the upstarts of Orlando and decided they had better try and find an equaliser….and they did, so they thought, as Haris Vuckic slotted home a James Tavernier pass only to look up and see the flag up for offside. In truth though, it was the only real opportunity the Magpies created. They were never at the races and although this may have only been a pre-season friendly for them, their traveling fans would have expected so much more from them.
In the end it was a great night for Orlando and manager Adrian Heath can be very proud of his players. “Everything happens for a reason. I am just excited to be here,” said Molino at the post-game press conference. “It was an incredible feeling to score against Newcastle. I’m just happy that I am here.”
Keep playing like that and this team may well attract the attention of the MLS.
Teams:
Orlando City: Miguel Gallardo, Jerome Mechalk, Kieron Bernard, Rob Valentino, Jack Traynor. Jamie Watson (46th), Yordany Alarez, Luke Bode, Lewis Neal. Max Griffin (74th), Matt Luzunaris (79th). Subs- Sean Kelley, Wes Allen, Adama Mbengue, Justin Fojo, Kevin Molino (46th), Charlie Campbell (79th), Ian Fuller, Dennis Chin (74th), Devorn Jorsling.
Newcastle United: Fraser Forster, Ryan Taylor (25th), Steven Taylor, Fabricio Coloccini (C), James Tavernier. Dan Gosling (70th), Alan Smith (73rd), Cheik Tiote, Jonas Gutierrez. Peter Lovenkrands (73rd), Leon Best (73rd). Subs- Steve Harper, Tim Krul, Jose Enrique (25th), Mehdi Abeid (73rd), Haris Vuckic (70th), Demba Ba (73rd), Shola Ameobi (73rd).
Attendance: 10,889
More photo’s here.
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