May 9, 2026
Two quick goals in added time lead CF Montreal over Orlando City SC at Stade Saputo
CF Montreal welcomed Orlando City to Stade Saputo this afternoon, following a solid midweek display, that saw CF Montreal’s lesser used players run rampant over the Calgary Blizzard. This, however, was a far tougher challenge.
Orlando City came into today’s match having defeated Inter Miami in their last game, following a win over New England prior to that. Strangely enough, like CF Montreal, Orlando City are warming up after a slow start to season, and now have three wins on the season – two of which came against two of the three best teams in the Eastern conference.
See Also: CF Montreal demolish Calgary Blizzard in Canadian Championship
On the back of their strong recent home form, CF Montreal look to have regain their confidence and hat has been a growing attribute ever since the coaching change. Since then, Montreal have won four of their five matches and are looking more and more and ease with passing game.
Tonight, against a team that was fresh off beating Inter Miami and the great Lionel Messi, Montreal set the pace, controlled the possession and set the tone – but struggled to find a breakthrough in the offensive end of the pitch.
To their credit, Orlando City did a good job at preventing Montreal’s midfield from feeding the red hot Prince Owusu. Perhaps overly worried about Montreal’s offense, meant that Orlando City earned very few scoring chances themselves, and found themselves hemmed into their own half on several occasions, fending off a strong CF Montreal attack.
Just when it looked like the team teams were going to share the points, everything changed. Luca Petrasso found space and dribbled the ball into the penalty area, applying pressure and was brought down by a panicked Robin Jansson, who probably didn’t have a lot of choice. Petrasso had a step on him and looked certain to earn a chance on goalkeeper Maxime Crépeau. Instead, Jansson brought down his man, and the referee immediately pointed to the penalty spot.
Susbitute striker Daniel Rios, who had come on for Prince Owusu, made no mistake. Calmly stepping up to the bar, and belting in beyond Crépeau, who had guessed right, but was too low to get a hand on the ball. Four minutes into added time, and CF Montreal had taken the lead.
Rios has now scored in his last two appearances for CF Montreal, having been one of five players to tally against the Calgary Blizzard at the Canadian Championship last Wednesday.
Icelandic international Dangur Thorhallsson doubled Montreal’s lead just minutes later, when he found the ball at his feet and a lot of room for him to maneuver in. He took a few steps, before hammering a quality shot into the left side of the net, as the bell at Stade Saputo once more rang out, announcing to the city that CF Montreal had scored.
““One of our values is audacity, said interim manager Philippe Eullaffroy. “At one point, you have to ask, ‘Are you okay with just one point or do you want to get three?’ We wanted to respect those values.”
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With this win, CF Montreal have now won their last four games at home, including a win over the Calgary Blizzard in the Canadian Championship – and tonight, move up several places in the standings. One of the teams they leapfrogged being Orlando City. While still early in the season, and despite a terrible start, CF Montreal is now just a win out of a playoff spot.
CF Montreal remain at home and will await the Portland Timbers in another midweek contest at Stade Saputo this Wednesday, May 13th. Orlando City, on the other hand, will head home where they take on the struggling Philadelphia Union, also on Wednesday.
