Whew… Another tough break for Angel City in a completely different way than last week. There was one common thread though. An own goal…

Unfortunate 2-3 loss on the road to the Orlando Pride on Friday night. However, unlike against Gotham, Angel City looked good for most of the game. Orlando started the game flat footed and Angel City readily took advantage of them. It wasn’t long before they scored their first goal. Rookie Riley Tiernan received a great ball from Kennedy Fuller and slotted one past Moorhouse near post in the 9th minute. It honestly felt like Los Angeles had pretty decent control of the game in the first half. Savy King had an incredible performance keeping Zambian superstar Barbra Banda quiet for most of the game. The entire backline honestly had a pretty good night. Right before halftime, Katie Zelem scored her first NWSL goal off a ball Orlando seemed to just be unable to clear out of their box. However, the tides turned against Angel City in the second half when defensive midfielder Alanna Kennedy had to come off due to a head injury (her second black eye in the month of April). This coincided with a wave of substitutions for Orlando who forcefully took hold of the momentum and did not let go.

In the 71st minute, Orlando captain and soccer legend, Marta, converted a cross from Oihane. Angelina Anderson had a few big saves throughout the night, but she couldn’t get a strong enough hand to that one. The Pride kept the pressure on and five minutes later Banda was able to get free of Zelem to put a header past Anderson. Angel City looked a lot more tired and disorganized by this point in the game and our substitutions neither improved the disjointedness between the lines nor increased the urgency to pull one back. For a bit I thought we would scrape by with a draw against last season’s champions, but a long ball into the box during stoppage time resulted in MA Vignola getting pushed into its trajectory and causing an own goal. I’m sure Angel City was kicking themselves for not putting away a couple more of their chances from the first half. It really is the hope that kills you…

These past two games have really highlighted Angel City’s lack of depth. The preferred starting XI, whether it includes either Zelem or Hodge, is pretty scary. However, there’s a drop off in quality when we look toward the bench. This may be why Interim Head Coach Sam Laity seems to make consistently confusing substitutions and game management choices in most games.

I think this game could have ended differently if Kennedy’s left eye hadn’t swollen shut, or if Mace Hodge had been available for this match. However, that wasn’t the case and we were in a position where we had to put in Madison Hammond and leave Zelem on for a full 90 in the Orlando heat and humidity. It’s also possible that Alyssa Thompson was not good to go for 90 minutes due to the injury that kept her out of the Gotham game the previous week. Thompson coming off in the 75th not only evaporated our offensive edge but some of our defensive pressure. Her being on the field presents the opposition with constant danger and she can really defend now. We frankly just look like a completely different team without Alyssa.

According to Christen Press’s PR agent, she is 100% healthy. If that’s true, it really is baffling as to why she does not play between 25-30 minutes every game. Minimum. The team could have used her veteran presence in a high pressure situation where we were both looking to score another goal and not concede another goal. Would it have changed the outcome of the game at that point? I don’t know. However, it does feel absurd to bring on 17 year-old Casey Phair, who has previously only played 15 minutes, and Julie Dufour, who has clearly not settled into the NWSL quite yet, alongside literal rookie Riley Tiernan to try and close out this game against the reigning champions. It just does not make sense.

Angel City has another tough matchup next week. Washington Spirit on the road. On Saturday their Head Coach Jonatan Giraldez got a red card so he won’t be available for the game, but some of their previously injured players got their first minutes back this weekend. Hopefully Angel City can walk away with something from this challenging stretch, but we’ll see. I will say that after this weekend we can definitively take our hands away from the “The NWSL Isn’t Exciting Anymore” Panic Button. At least we have that!