Maxime Crépeau, who finished with two saves, turned away an Elias Achouri effort at the top corner in the 10th minute of stoppage. Photo by Mario Casamalhuapa
Antoine Griezmann needed one clean look. Orlando City SC needed one goal. On a night when the visitors held the ball and the Lions held the lead, that was the whole story: Griezmann's right-footed finish from the middle of the box in the 28th minute stood up for a 1-0 win over San Diego FC at Inter.Co Stadium.
Justin Ellis played the pass. Griezmann steered it inside the bottom-left corner past CJ dos Santos, and the margin never changed. It should have been wider. Dos Santos denied Griezmann twice — once from distance in the seventh minute, again from close range at the edge of the six-yard box in the 87th. Wilder Cartagena rattled the crossbar in the 88th off a David Brekalo delivery from a corner. Orlando created the better chances all night and had to settle for one.
It got chippy at the end. The fourth official announced nine minutes of stoppage time, and five yellow cards came out from the 84th minute on — David Vazquez and Kieran Sargeant for San Diego, Luis Otávio, Brekalo and Iván Angulo for Orlando. Anders Dreyer hit the right post in the second minute of added time. Maxime Crépeau, who finished with two saves, turned away an Elias Achouri effort at the top corner in the 10th minute of stoppage. Orlando held on through all of it and did not concede.
Martín Ojeda's return mattered. He came on for Bernardo Rhein in the 51st minute and looked like a man who had been waiting on it — a shot that forced a save in the 59th, then chances created for Angulo and Marco Pasalic inside the next 25 minutes. This is a different roster than the one that opened the season, and the difference has a name. Griezmann has pulled this group together. With Ojeda healthy and everyone working in the same direction, there is no ceiling on how far up the table this team can climb.
The three points move Orlando to eighth in the Eastern Conference, and the next two are winnable. The Lions travel to Atlanta on Wednesday to face a side sitting 14th, then host Toronto FC on Sept. 12 with the Reds in 11th. Two games against teams below them. Six points on the table. A playoff run starts with weeks like this one.
