FC Cincinnati midfielder, co-leading scorer and occasional captain, Evander, has been named to the MLS All-Star Team for the second time with The Orange and Blue and third time in his MLS career. The best of the best are set to take on the Liga MX All-Stars on July 29 at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina, at the MLS All-Star Game presented by Chime.
His selection to the squad marks the 11th time an FC Cincinnati player has been named to the squad, and the fifth year in a row FCC have had a representative in the match. He is also the third player in club history to be named to the squad in multiple years.
With nine goals and six assists in just 14 league appearances this season, Evander became the all-time leading Brazilian goal-scorer in Major League Soccer history and has risen through the highest ranks of goal scorers in FC Cincinnati history in his year and a half with the club. On May 23, Evander set the club record for goal contributions in a single match with five (two goals, three assists) and is currently third all-time in goal contributions with the club with 57.
“It's special. It’s the third time in a row and really happy with that achievement. I’m really happy to represent Cincinnati again as an All-Star,” Evander said Wednesday after FC Cincinnati training when the rosters were formally announced. “I am pretty happy that even though I didn't have a great start of the season, after a couple games I got back to my best performance and was helping the team in the best way. So I was pretty happy to deliver good numbers with FCC in the first part of the season, and be named to the roster.”
An All-Star in 2024 as a member of the Portland Timbers and in 2025 with FC Cincinnati, Evander now joins a squad of 29 players selected by Fan Vote, Coach’s Selection and Commissioner's Pick, set to take on the best of Mexico’s Liga MX. Charlotte FC Head Coach Dean Smith is set to lead the MLS All-Stars as the host city's representative.
The match, which kicks off on July 29 at 8 p.m., along with the MLS All-Star Skills Challenge presented by AT&T, will be streamed on Apple TV. Last season, Evander was the star of the Skills Challenge, setting the all-time point record in the MLS All-Star Shooting Challenge presented by AT&T, putting up 72 points in the sharpshooting event.
In addition to Evander representing FC Cincinnati, Connor Dale and Dom Lester will be representing the FC Cincinnati Academy at the MLS NEXT All-Star Game on Monday, July 27, to kick off the week's All-Star festivities. Dale, 16, is a goalkeeper who has recently been called up to US Youth National Team camps, and Lester, also 16, is a defender who has been called up to represent the Jamaica U17 national team. Both have represented the FC Cincinnati Academy across multiple levels, including premier tournaments such as MLS NEXT Flex, MLS NEXT Cup and the GA Cup, all earlier this season. More recently, both have made their professional debuts with FC Cincinnati 2 in MLS NEXT Pro.
The MLS NEXT All-Star Game pits the best of the Academy system from across the landscape against each other in an East vs West match. This year, the game will be played at the Mecklenburg County Sportsplex in Matthews, North Carolina, with kickoff set for 7:30 p.m. ET. The match will be streamed live on Major League Soccer’s YouTube channel and on MLSSoccer.com.
Dale and Lester become the eighth and ninth FC Cincinnati Academy players to represent the club at the All-Star game, joining former participants who have gone on to make the first team, such as Andrei Chirila, Stefan Chirila, Stiven Jimenez and Ademar Chávez. This is also the fourth year in a row that FC Cincinnati have sent more than one player to the event.
For more information on all of the MLS All-Star festivities, visit https://www.mlssoccer.com/allstar/2026/.
