Orange County SC have just wrapped up their seven game preseason this past weekend and will now shift all of their attention to the regular season. After coming off a third consecutive Western Conference semifinal exit, Orange County saw to it to get a lot younger while, for the most part, retaining much of the same core from last season.
Notable departures from last season include, but not limited to, Colin Shutler, Tristan Trager, Cameron Dunbar and Bryce Jamison. Already OC is looking to replace almost all of their offensive core and their goalkeeper.
Among the newcomers, there are certainly a number of interesting players looking to make a name for themselves. For the most part Orange County did not make any splash signings but instead opted for bolstering its squad depth. This is very much the case for newer signings Jamir Johnson, Mataeo Bunbury and Marcelo Palomino. All offensive minded players.
As far as the back line and midfield go it is nearly the same group as last season.
All of these signings were made before preseason games were played, which is not always the standard operating procedure for OC, but it does mean that they will have had plenty of game time to get used to one another with a tougher schedule than past preseasons.
THE MLS TRIFECTA
Orange County’s first three preseason games all came against MLS opponents, two of them on the road. Preseason games against MLS teams are way more secretive than other match ups, so information and lineups for the away games are essentially impossible to confirm. However what we do know about the away games specifically is that OC lost to both LAFC and LA Galaxy’s senior sides 1-0 and 2-0 respectively.
The third game against Real Salt Lake was an OC home game, ending in a 1-1 draw with Lyam MacKinnon scoring the lone goal for OC. This was a pretty good result, all things considered. RSL did not rest many of their main players, with both Diego Luna and DeAndre Yedlin playing. The RSL game also saw OC play a majority of their main players, so this was the first time we were able to see Alex Rando, Marcelo Palomino and the aforementioned Jamir Johnson play.
USL OPPONENTS PAST AND PRESENT
The next two games for Orange County are probably the least influential of the bunch. Orange County SC would welcome El Paso Locomotive and tough out another 1-1 draw. Sources say Ethan Zubak got the goal for Orange County, and that is really all we know about the game.
The next game in the preseason might as well not even have happened.
OC welcomed Ventura County FC (the team formerly known as LA Galaxy II) back to Championship Soccer Stadium, but it was the visitors that would easily win the match 3-0. This was essentially Orange County’s C team playing with the roster being made mainly of trialists. Orange County SC in name only.
SENIOR TEAM WOES
The final two games of the preseason were against AV Alta and UCLA. The AV Alta match was played on the same day as the Ventura County FC match, with really the main team taking the field. OC definitely had its chances in the match but it would again be held scoreless. It was another super unfriendly “friendly” between these two clubs, so it will be very interesting to see if they will keep wanting to play each other or not.
To this point in the preseason, OCSC had only scored two goals across five games.
Nonetheless, they had one more tuneup game to go through: against UCLA. This was the traditional season ticket holder match, something of a test run for the club and stadium operations.
Orange County SC would actually get off to a great 2-0 start with a first half brace from Lyam MacKinnon but UCLA to their credit really flipped a switch and would score three unanswered goals. For most of the second half, it was the Bruins that were the way more dangerous looking team with constant possession and pressure on the OC back line. This was not an inexperienced OC team either, but they struggled and as a result ended the preseason winless.
“Trialist #2” did nearly tie the game at the death, but the UCLA keeper denied him.
TAKEAWAYS
A couple of years ago one of my very first articles I wrote tackled the question if preseason results really did matter or not. This is a perfect scenario to bring that up again. Orange County has not looked very impressive, to say the least, on either side of the pitch. They did not register any clean sheets in the preseason and only scored four goals in seven games. Yes, you can very easily say that players and coaches are still getting used to game speed, but OC themselves are not a team that starts seasons off strong to begin with anyway. They will begin the regular season with a very winnable game at home against Las Vegas and one would hope that the team finds their groove sooner rather than later.
Orange County SC is back, hopefully.