SANFORD, Fla. — For Orlando City coach James O’Connor, the greatest challenge of the final week of training this season is controlling the Lions’ emotions.
Between falling out of the postseason race and posting back-to-back lackluster results on the road, the coach said the team has struggled to maintain its typical positive energy throughout this week.
“It’s trying to manage the frustration,” O’Connor said. “We’re all feeling, I mean even the coaching staff— I don’t want to use too strong of a word, but we’re frustrated. For us, it’s trying to make sure you manage that in a productive way.”
Orlando City has improved in a variety of individual areas — cutting its goals against by almost 40% and kickstarting the careers of homegrown players Benji Michel and Santiago Patiño. Last season, the team was out of the playoff conversation by August. This year, the Lions stayed in it until the final week of the regular season.
But to O’Connor and the Lions, narrowly missing the first playoff bid in club history only made it hurt more. As the team preps for the final game of the season, O’Connor said no one is ready to look back at the positives yet, instead focusing on channeling his players’ emotions into Sunday’s game against Chicago.
“We can point to a number of things and go that’s better, that’s better, that’s better,” O’Connor said. “But equally when you don’t make the playoffs, we’re really irritated and really frustrated, all of us. When we have time to sit and go through it, there will be a load of factors where we can see we’ve made big improvements. But now is not the time to feel that.”
Orlando City party
The club is partnering with City Furniture on Friday night to host a first “Delivering Hope Pajama Party,” which will offer the chance for 100 local youth to spend a day at Exploria Stadium. The participants — who were selected through the Orlando City Foundation — will sign a one-day contract with Orlando City and take part in events at the stadium.
At the conclusion of the day, each child will receive a new twin-sized bed, mattress and set of pillows, sheets and comforters, courtesy of City Furniture.
Pereyra goes blonde
Although designated player Mauricio Pereyra is known most in Orlando for making daring choices on the field, his most recent bold decision came off it. The midfielder showed up to training on Wednesday morning with his hair dyed platinum blonde, a drastic change from his natural dark brown.
Orlando City teammates took to social media to give him a light ribbing over the new look. The biggest perk for fans on Sunday — it’ll be that much easier to identify the midfielder on the field.
So um Mauricio Pereyra did a thing and I need to hear everyone’s opinions on it right this second pic.twitter.com/t49Uc1sW7m
— Julia Poe (@byjuliapoe) October 2, 2019
Injury update
Midfielder Cristian Higuita and defender João Moutinho are officially shut down for the final weekend of the season. Higuita suffered a “grade 1” adductor injury during the team’s match against Houston. He returned to light training on the side of the team this week, but he will not be cleared to play Sunday.
Moutinho returned from a quad injury during this past Sunday’s game against Cincinnati, only to exit 14 minutes into action due to a fresh injury. O’Connor identified the injury as a “grade 2” calf injury on Wednesday and said Moutinho will undergo evaluation from team trainers to assess when he can return to training in the offseason.