Orlando City vs. Houston Dynamo, Leagues Cup: Photo Gallery

Well, it wasn’t the three points that the Lions were hoping for, but Orlando City bested the Houston Dynamo in penalty kicks, 5-4, after playing to a 1-1 draw to take two points in the quirky scoring system of Leagues Cup. Orlando (0-0-1, 2 points) and Houston (0-0-1, 1 point) largely kept each other at bay for most of the night, each scoring on a gift – Houston’s in the form of a raspberry-award quality dive that was given as a penalty to close the first half, and Orlando’s as a howler of a pass from Houston `keeper Andrew Tarbell to a hustling Duncan McGuire to start the second half.

The Lions appear to have found a new right back in Dagur Dan Thorhallsson, who was brought on at halftime for Kyle Smith and filled the role well. Orlando City Head Coach Oscar Pareja said in the press availability after the game that this was something Thorhallsson had been working on, so it will be interesting to see how many minutes the versatile Icelandic player gets there in the future. Juninho made a cameo at the end — one of the four OCB players on the bench — continuing the play-your-kids trends we’ve seen of late.

While spot kicks as a game resolution are not a great way to determine games, they are a lot of fun as a photographer. We hope you enjoy the photos of the first two-point game in Orlando City (and Leagues Cup) history.