CINCINNATI — Evander Da Silva Ferreira — known simply as “Evander” — had two goals and three assists, Kenji Mboma Dem scored two goals, his first multi-goal game in MLS, and FC Cincinnati beat Orlando City 6-2 on Saturday night.
The Lions fell to 4-9-2 and remain at 14 points in Major League Soccer’s Eastern Conference. The devastating loss comes in Orlando City’s final match before the league’s World Cup break.
Martín Ojeda converted from the penalty spot to open the scoring in the 16th minute and scored on a free kick from 24 yards out to make it 2-2 in the 48th minute for Orlando. Ojeda has 11 goal this season, nine in the last seven games. It was his fourth multi-goal match this season.
The wheels came off after that for the Lions, who could have climbed into a tie with Cincinnati for ninth place in the East table. The top nine sides in each conference advance to the playoffs.
On the counter-attack, Evander played a cross from the left side to a charging Mboma Dem for a first-touch finish from just beyond the penalty spot in the 52nd minute and Evander rolled a shot from inside the penalty arc inside the right post to make it 4-2 in the 58th.
Evander, who has seven goals and five assists in his past five games, is the first player in club history with at least two goals and two assists in a single game.
Cincinnati coach Pat Noonan earned his 75th regular-season win in just 151 games, tied with Seattle’s Brian Schmetzer fastest to the mark in the MLS post-shootout era (since 2000).
Kevin Denkey scored his club-leading ninth goal this season in the 77th minute and Tom Barlow capped the scoring in the first minute of stoppage time.
Cincinnati (5-5-5), which snapped a three-game winless streak. has scored multiple goals in a club-record (MLS era) eight consecutive games.
Roman Celentano had seven saves for FC Cincinnati.
Evander, on the counter-attack, took a pass from Pavel Bucha and rolled a shot from the left side of the area inside the back post to give Cincinnati a 2-1 lead in first-half stoppage time.
Mboma Dem headed home a corner kick played into the area by Evander to make it 1-1 in the 42nd minute.
Orlando City has allowed a MLS-worst 44 goals this season. It is the second time this season the Lions have conceded six goals in a match and they have allowed five goals in a match twice.
Maxime Crépeau had five saves for the Lions.
Orlando is off until July 22, when the Lions travel to northern California to take on the San Jose Earthquakes. Orlando City’s first home match after the break will be July 25 against Nashville.
French forward and World Cup winner Antoine Griezmann will join up with the squad in July, and he will be counted upon to help elevate the offense to an even higher level. The bigger issue, however, will be what to do to fix the Orlando City defense.