Lions dispose of Toronto FC, 3-0, stay in 6th in MLS East
Antoine Griezmann scored the kind of goal that looks simple and is not. Zakaria Taifi put the cross into the danger area. Griezmann got there first, off balance, with a defender on his shoulder, and lifted a left-footed finish high into the goal from almost no space at all. He arrived on the stroke of halftime, which is the cruelest moment to concede, and Toronto FC went in knowing exactly what it had just lost.
Harvey Sarajian's was better. He had been on the field two minutes when the cross came into the middle of the box. He took it down, laid it off to Daryl Dike and kept moving. Dike gave it straight back to him. Sarajian picked the bottom-left corner with his right foot, and then he flipped — a full celebration flip, the kind you get to do once, because it was his first goal. Control, movement, finish. Substitutes are supposed to change games. Not many of them do it that fast.
Then Iván Angulo got one, and that mattered as much as either. Justin Ellis drove the break in the dying seconds and laid it off. Angulo took it in the center of the box and passed it into the middle of the goal with his left foot, no fuss, no panic. He has been putting in the work on that left side all season. Saturday night the scoresheet finally said so.
Three goals, three completely different kinds. A finish from a world champion. A power forward's goal from a kid off the bench. A reward for a winger who keeps running. That is what a team looks like when it is working, and Orlando City SC has now won three in a row playing that way.
There will be harder nights, and two of them come this week. Orlando travels to face the Columbus Crew in the U.S. Open Cup semifinals on Wednesday, an away game with a place in the final on the line. Then it travels again Saturday to play the third-place New England Revolution. Both of those are bigger than Saturday night was. But nights like this are why anybody buys a ticket. Three goals, three players, and a bench that made the difference. It is a good time to be an Orlando City fan. Enjoy it, then go win the one that gets you a final.