Orlando City coach
Kreis won’t measure team’s performance against other squads’
Jason Kreis says he won’t measure the team’s performance against the level of play of other squads.
Comparisons are made every day. In soccer, they usually center on whether one player is better than another or if a young talent's style is reminiscent of a veteran’s, how opposing defenses match up, how coaches approach the same situations differently. The list goes on.
Orlando City coach Jason Kreis isn’t a big fan of all those comparisons — unless they’re made using the Lions against themselves.
“I will continue to say that we measure ourselves against our- selves,” Kreis said a day before Orlando City’s 2-1 loss Wednesday in Toronto.
He went on to say he thought last weekend’s victory at home against the Colorado Rapids was the best performance to date, so that is the team’s measuring stick and not any rival in the league.
“Can we perform like that? Can we do all of the little things that add up to positive results that we did this past weekend?” Kreis asked.
After coming out flat in the first 45 minutes of the Toronto match and conceding two early goals, the answer was no.
But after the game, Kreis didn’t talk about how TFC’s attack of Sebastian Giovinco, Jozy
able to maneuver through defenders with ease and create a slew of chances between Giovinco’s ninthand 38th- minute goals. He didn’t compare Orlando City to Toronto in the Lions’ lackluster first half or in the more dominant second half.
He stuck to self-comparison.
“We're going to continue to judge ourselves by ourselves, and I thought the first 45 minutes, that wasn't like us,” Kreis said. “We’ve got to hold ourselves to a higher standard than that.
“I really think the group, for whatever reason, didn’t come into the game with the right mindset, didn't come into the game with the right energy, and when we do that we know that we're still not there. We haven’t done anything yet. We haven’t won anything yet. And so, we can never afford to go out there and give anything less than our best. If we do that we're going to be in trouble.”
Using that same rule, centerback Tommy Redding agreed the first half was not good, but he thought the second half was the team’s best performance of the year.
Midfielder Servando Carrasco also said the start of the match was lacking compared to their previous games and he believes that now needs to be an area of focus.
Using numbers to compare, Orlando City had nine shots against Toronto compared to 14 against Colorado. Of those nine shots, two were in the first half. In the Colorado match, the Lions took seven shots in the first half.
Orlando City’s possession was more than 68 percent in the first 20 minutes of the Colorado match and 48 percent in Toronto.
And, Toronto’s goals were the quickest and third-quickest of the seven total conceded by Orlando City so far this year. The second-quickest goal conceded was scored by Columbus’ Justin Meram in the 13th minute of Orlando City's only other loss this season.
Striker Cyle Larin said, “I think the games before this, we gave 100 percent from the first minute to the last minute. Next game we have to do that.”
The next game is two days away in Houston. The quick turnaround means Orlando City will face challenges it hasn’t experienced this year, not even with the Toronto road trip, which came four days after Colorado.
“We also have a great group of guys who are willing to fight and work for each other, we’re all really focus on getting three points this weekend,” Redding said. “We don’t want to end this road trip with nothing.”
Orlando City’s Tommy Redding agreed the first half against Toronto was not good, but he thought the second half was the team’s best performance of the year.