Heath: Lions will fight for win in regular-season finale

Orlando City will head to Philadelphia for the regular-season finale with its playoff chances reduced to nearly zero.

To make the postseason, the Lions would need to close an eight-goal gap between themselves and the New England Revolution, requiring some combination of a blowout Orlando City win and a complete Revolution collapse in its finale against New York City FC.

Short of a miracle, the Lions won’t be competing in the playoffs to cap their inaugural season. It doesn’t mean they’ll put any less of an emphasis, however, on finishing the year with a win.

“Obviously the weekend wasn’t the best for us, but in terms of what we’ve done the last few weeks, the commitment from the players have been exceptional [and] we want to finish the season off well,” Orlando City coach Adrian Heath said.

“Obviously everyone is a bit down because we put so much effort into getting ourselves into this position, but it is what it is, we’ve got to move on and I want to win the game on Sunday.”

The Lions, then, won’t be fielding a young squad against the Union, who are coming off a listless 4-1 loss to the New York Red Bulls.

Orlando City will be trying to pile up as many goals as possible in a win, and that means using the strongest lineup it has available.

Kaká and Brek Shea will be back from yellow-card suspensions to add more bite to an Orlando City squad that was menacing against NYCFC last Friday.

“For me, there is still hope and where there is hope there’s life,” Lions defender Aurélien Collin said. “If New England loses by three, we can score seven. Anything is possible. So right now, we’re still focused in training like we’re going to the playoffs. And when there is no more hope, we can talk about [the future].”

A win would still give Orlando City 13 victories this year, the most wins by an expansion team in modern MLS history ahead of the 2009 Seattle Sounders and 2012 Montreal Impact. The 47 points would tie Seattle for most points by an expansion team in the last 15 years.

The Chicago Fire had 20 wins and 56 points as an expansion team in 1998, the third season in MLS history. Chicago faced a much smaller lineup of teams and went on to win the MLS Cup that year.

Hall suffers meniscus tear

Orlando City goalkeeper Tally Hall will have surgery today to repair a torn meniscus suffered against New York City FC.

The club announced Sunday that Hall would miss the final game of the season due to the injury, which happened late in the Lions’ 2-1 win. Heath confirmed it was a torn meniscus in Hall’s right knee, the same knee in which he tore his ACL last season.

Recovery time for a torn meniscus depends on the extent of the damage and the type of surgery needed, but it can range between four weeks and six months.

The MLS preseason begins in February, and Orlando City will open the 2016 season in March.

The Lions did not provide a timeline for Hall’s recovery.

Orlando City will start goalkeeper Josh Ford against Philadelphia on Sunday.

MLS pool goalkeeper Trey Mitchell will serve as the back-up and was at training on Monday.