Orlando City throw away three points in Chicago
A new season. Same old Orlando City.
1-0 up through Dom Dwyer’s first goal of the season as the game reached 94.01 minutes of four minutes added time, the Lion’s defence went to sleep and allowed CJ Sapong, a former Orlando player, to rise without challenge and head home past Brian Rowe in the City goal with literally the last action of the game.
After a dull first half, Dwyer provided the first goal of the game in the 47th minute as he stole in between Chicago defender Johan Kappelhof and goalkeeper David Ousted to lob the ball over the keeper and into an empty net.
Orlando then carved open another opportunity in the 64th minute as Nani fed a nicely weighted through ball to Ruan’s excellent run down the right flank. Fire defender Jorge Corrales went in to the challenge but only succeeded in bringing down the 23 year old Brazilian and saw red for denying a goal scoring opportunity.
Playing a man down, Chicago were given a lifeline as Orlando once again decided to throw the game away. With 30 seconds left in the game, substitute Chris Mueller had the ball on the left flank. Instead of going down to the corner flag to run the seconds off the clock, he decided to cross the ball to Dwyer who was standing unmarked in an offside position. The resultant free kick enabled the home side to get the ball forward and they worked the ball to Przemyslaw Frankowski who provided an inch perfect cross for Sapong who notched his second goal in as many games to earn his side a valuable point.
Full Time: Chicago Fire 1 Orlando City 1
Lineups/Substitutions:
Orlando City SC – GK Brian Rowe; D Shane O’Neill, Alex de John, Kamal Miller; M Kyle Smith (Ruan 58’), Will Johnson, Sacha Kljestan, Sebastián Méndez, Danilo Acosta; F Tesho Akindele (Dom Dwyer 21’), Nani ⓒ (Chris Mueller 89’)
Substitutes Not Used: GK Greg Ranjitsingh; D Carlos Ascues; M Oriol Rosell; Josue Colman
Chicago Fire – GK David Ousted; D Diego Campos (Fabian Herbers 80’), Marcelo, Johan Kappelhof, Jorge Corrales; M CJ Sapong, Dax McCarty, Djordje Mihalovic (Nicolas Hasler 69’), Bastian Schweinsteiger, Aleksandar Katai; F Nemanja Nikolic (Prezemyslaw Frankowski 68’)
Substitutes Not Used: GK Richard Sanchez, D Grant Lillard, M Brandt Bronico, Cristian Martinez
Attendance: 17,000
