Aug. 29, 2017 at Sylvan Lake Park
Availability: HC Jason Kreis, F Giles Barnes, F Carlos Rivas
HC Jason Kreis
- Forward Cyle Larin has been called away to the Canadian men’s national team and will miss Orlando City SC’s match against the New England Revolution on Saturday.
(jokingly) Does it make my choice easier? Is that what you’re saying?
Yes and no. Yes and no because we still have a player like Giles who could step into the striker position, which is much more of his natural position than to play in midfield for us. So it does still leave us with choices. And as we get to this point of the season, we are certainly—all the pressure is on us to make the right ones, so we put a lot of consideration and time and energy into these choices.
- Saturday’s match against New England was originally scheduled in the beginning of the season but was rescheduled because of unplayable weather conditions in Massachusetts.
I don’t think so. I don’t think so. I think, right now, where we’re at and feeling like we’re in a rhythm with our play but consistent with our performances, unfortunately, not the results to go with them. But I think the consistency of our performances lends itself well to playing again this weekend and not taking a weekend off.
- Kreis isn’t too concerned about missing players from his team because he knows New England is also missing players.
Yeah, I think we’re both missing some players, right? They’ve had [Lee] Nguyen and [Kelyn] Rowe out as of late. They got a couple guys that are on international duty as well. And so we both go into this game. We put our best foot forward, we believe in all of our players, and we see what happens. I think it’s gonna be an interesting game. But, obviously, both teams are basically do or die, I think.
- The New England match is the start of four-game road trip.
We need to—as I’ve been saying now for several weeks—we need to remove this feeling of this many games in a row. This many number on the road, this many games left, this many points we need left. For us, now, it’s just about this game in front of us. You know, everything we can to take all three points.
- Forward Dom Dwyer has now played four matches and started three of those appearances for Orlando City.
- Kreis said it’s time for Dwyer to score.
Should be. Yeah, it should be. And not to put any new pressure on him, but I think he can handle it. I think he’s the guy that can be pressured a little bit to score goals, and I think it’s time. So, yeah, he’ training well. He’s playing well. He’s getting chances in the game, and now it’s about putting them away.
- Orlando City B, the club’s United Soccer League side, is on an 11-game unbeaten streak following a 3-0 win on the road over No. 1 Louisville City FC on Aug. 26.
Yeah, absolutely. Had a nice long meeting with [Orlando City B head coach Anthony Pulis] and his staff yesterday about the players and the potentials in the OCB group, kind of what he sees and what we see from a little bit more of an outsider’s view. He’s got more of a day-to-day view, what he sees in those guys training in week to week, what he sees in the matches, and we have a snapshot of just watching the matches on video. So, we kind of matched up our views for the players, and I think there’s some interesting prospects for us there. So I think that program for me is continuing to be a success and continuing to show it’s a necessary program.
- Instead of following the usual routine and leaving one day before the match, Kreis and his team will leave two days before.
A couple of things. I really do feel like as I get more and more experience in this league and as the stakes continue to rise and as the level of performance continues to rise and as what’s necessary of the players continues to rise in order to perform well, I think that maybe a possible solution to some of the travel worries is to go a day earlier—to kinda take, remove some of that—you know, you got weather difficulties, you got a plane that’s late. You know, all of that pressure being the day before the game could be alleviated if we start to travel a day earlier. So it’s just been an idea in my mind for a while, and ownership has been very supportive. In fact, they think, maybe, another idea to get out of this heat would be to go to cooler climates where we’re playing the game and train there. So it’s a little bit of a mesh of our ideas together to go one day early and see if we can train up there on the day before the game, see if that might help some things a little bit.
- Midfielder Will Johnson is recovering from an ankle injury.
- He trained with the team on Wednesday.
- Center-back Jonathan Spector is still recovering from a knee injury and is out for the New England match.
Will trained nearly fully today and looked good. Looked like he’s ready. I think he’s in quite a bit of pain, so I think it’s gonna come down to whether or not he can withstand that pain. Obviously, when a player has an injury like that, you tend to think, “Oh, maybe we should be careful ’cause we want him to be out for multiple weeks,” but you get to this point of the season, and you say, “We gotta go for it, I think.” So, we’ll see how he recovers from this session because he put a lot into it, and we’ll see what he’s like tomorrow.
Jonathan is out. Yeah, again, continues to do his rehab and his therapy, and he has moved things forward this week, and we hope that we take a giant step forward next week, and hopefully there’ll be some consideration for the D.C. United game.
- In Larin’s absence, OCB forward Hadji Barry could possibly be promoted.
- He’s scored eight goals in 13 games and 12 starts in the USL this season.
Yeah, Hadji’s been playing very well for OCB. Obviously, with Cyle gone this weekend, I think that he will definitely be in consideration for the 18 for us.
F Giles Barnes
- For Barnes, the key to returning to winning ways is remaining positive.
- The Lions last won on June 30, a 1-0 victory over Real Salt Lake.
Keep staying positive… We know how close we are. You know, we’ve been unfortunate for there was a lot of chances on Saturday that we—inches, you know, hit the bar, balls just going wide of the post. It’s there, you know? Possession-wise, you know, we kept the ball well. We worked hard. It was just unfortunate we got caught with the two goals.
- Barnes is confident in the players that will fill in for the missing perennial starters.
That’s why we have a squad, you know? The boys that haven’t been playing been working hard, and, you know, this is their chance to go out there and stake their claim for being in the starting 11. We need points, so, you know, everyone’s got their bit between their teeth and needs to go out there and show exactly what we’re made of.
- Hurricane Harvey has caused severe flooding in Houston, Texas, where Barnes’ home is located.
You know, I’ve not actually been able to check it right now. Someone, hopefully, will be going over there to check it today but couldn’t get into my neighborhood. So, it’s just a waiting game. But, you know, prayers for everyone that have been affected in Houston. And there’s gonna be something big that’s gonna be happening with a few of the franchises over there. So, we’ll hopefully, you know, get Houston back to how it was.
Yeah, for sure, since I’ve been here, [Houston] is my home. That’s where i still live now. And I’ve got a lot of friends. My godson is over there as well. So a lot of friends and family that are still over there. So, you know, but, at the end of the day, it’s about everyone being safe and, you know, making the city great again.
Yeah, you know, a few of the boys, you know, I’ve been—obviously, they got actually away from the hurricane. A few, actually, had to stay, unfortunately. Spoke to a couple of the old players, you know, Stu Holden. He’s actually gonna be doing a fundraiser with [Houston Dynamo president of business operations] Chris Canetti and Brian Ching, so, i think there’s a lot of players that are gonna wanna get involved in that and play in that. [Houston Texans defensive end] J.J. Watt’s, obviously, doing amazing things well and, obviously, with the franchises and organizations over there to make Houston great again.
- For Barnes, he feels his team is on the brink of getting the necessary results.
- The team has eight games left and are five points back from the playoffs.
They’re a good team. Free-flowing, attacking-wise. They like to keep the ball. But, as I said, I feel we’re just so close right now. So, we need to go out there, work hard, you know. The harder you work, the luckier you’re gonna get. So, just add that to our mentality and go there and get the three points.
- The Revolution and Orlando City are in similar positions.
- New England is two points behind ninth-place Orlando City.
- The Lions have played 26 games while New England has played 24.
- Fifth-place New York Red Bulls has played 25 games, and sixth-place Atlanta United FC has played 24.
No, you know, there’s no more pressing situation than we’re in already. We know where we are. We know where we should be and where we want to get to. So, every single game, every single minute is gonna be a scrap and a fight, and that’s what we’re prepared to do.
F Carlos Rivas
(translated from Spanish)
- Rivas sees the New England game as a match the Lions need to yield a result from in order to stay in the playoff hunt.
We know it’s a great team. We have to prepare well these next two days. If we wanna get a good result, we need to—we need to get a positive result in order for us to continue pushing for playoffs.
- Kreis is experimenting and searching for the right attacking combination between Larin, Dwyer, Rivas and Barnes.
I know that any of the three that play up top is gonna do a good job, is gonna attack well. We don’t have any problem in playing with each other, combining with each other to help the team offensively.
- So far this season, Rivas has scored a career-high five goals and recorded a career-high five assists.
Yeah, I try to shoot it on goal all the time. The games, it’s only worked a few times. One was against Colorado. But I work hard at training to make sure that I try to hit the goal as much as I can.
- For Orlando City, the chances have been created, but the team hasn’t been finishing.
- In the 2-1 loss to the Vancouver Whitecaps, Orlando City out-shot Vancouver 25-7.
Yeah, we know that we work really hard at training and during the games to get the three points. But sometimes in the games, we make mistakes. We try to learn from them, and, hopefully, we stop making those so we can get the results.
For more on Orlando City, as they try to claw their way into a playoff spot with eight games to go, follow Victor Tan on Twitter at @NDR_VictorTan.
