Orange County still reviewing Orlando City plans to host fans
Orlando City fans may have to wait a bit longer to attend a match and cheer on their Lions.
While MLS announced the first phase of matches at home venues that could feature a limited number of fans in attendance, the Lions may not have county approval to host supporters during their next scheduled home match against Nashville SC on Aug. 26.
Orange County officials and Major League Soccer need to sign off on Orlando City’s plan, which a source told the Orlando Sentinel calls for limiting attendance to 30% of Exploria Stadium’s capacity, requiring mask use and practicing social distancing.
“They have an interesting plan,” said Dr. Raul Pino, Orange County’s state health officer of Orlando City’s proposal submitted to the health department.
He said the plan calls for spectators to be socially distanced across the stadium. But a challenge, Pino said, will be to make sure large crowds don’t congregate together as they enter and exit the venue.
Pino said he thinks there is a way the soccer team could arrange for people to enter and exit on a staggered basis. He added that UCF is also exploring similar options for its stadium.
“We are listening to all the proposals,” he said. “We are learning from it.”
When asked how far along Orlando City was in the process of earning county approval, Pino responded, “I don’t think that we are at the point of having large events of that nature.”
Orange County mayor Jerry Demings said he had not yet seen proposals from Orlando City and UCF, but he was hesitant to sign off on fans attending games.
“I think that one of the reasons that you have seen the numbers steadily decline here is because of the different measures that have been put in place,” he said. “I believe that they’re working, so I don’t think now is the time to relax any of those restrictions. I certainly will listen to our healthcare experts and the epidemiologists regarding this virus and consider anything they have to say in that regard, but I have not seen any specific plans for either one of the groups that you have mentioned going forward.
“So we’ll reserve our final opinion about it until that time.”
Orlando City has some time to prepare and hopes it can welcome back a limited number of fans under the right conditions, but executive vice president of operations Luiz Muzzi acknowledged it may be difficult to host fans during all of the Lions’ remaining home matches. He said it would require both approval from health officials and fans feeling comfortable about going to the stadium during the pandemic.
“I think it’s likely that we’re going to have some games without fans,” Muzzi said two weeks ago. “But I think the most important thing is that we need to be safe and playing games as soon as possible.
“Once we get that going, then we’re going to eventually move back to having games at the stadium and to normal games, but it’s going to be a process.”