Fueled by a record breaking performance, FC Cincinnati’s final match at TQL Stadium for nearly two months started slow but ended with a bang. In a night no supporter of The Orange and Blue will forget for a long while, FC Cincinnati’s star midfielder Evander recorded five goal contributions in Saturday night’s victory over Orlando City SC – scoring twice and adding three assists to give FC Cincinnati a 6-2 victory.
After a slow start to the night's action with Orlando pressing hard and eventually taking the lead off a penalty shot in the 16’, FC Cincinnati stormed back for one of their greatest offensive breakouts in recent memory. Evander and Kenji Mboma Dem both earned a brace with Kévin Denkey and Tom Barlow putting the cherry on top for six goals to neatly secure all three and head into the 2026 FIFA World Cup summer break with an even 5-5-5 record overall.
And doing so by electrifying a sold out TQL Stadium crowd.
“A nice way to go into the break. A very good attacking output, and a lot of guys performed well,” Head Coach Pat Noonan said of the victory to open his press conference. “There are still things that if we want to take our group to another level, we have to learn from some of these things we’ve done previously and eliminate them. But overall, you score six goals against a very good Orlando team.”
“Tonight it was just motivation to win in front of our home fans,” Evander, who was named man of the match, said after the game. “Last week we let them down with the games – we had three games and only two points, and I think it wasn't enough. Tonight was the last game before the break, so we wanted to do well, we want to show the fans that we see our team as strong and that we still can dream of something big this season.”
After an opening quarter hour of lackluster play, FC Cincinnati got the wakeup call they needed after Kyle Smith conceded a penalty and Orlando took the lead. From there, everything changed. FCC cleaned up some of their play and began to turn the screws on Orlando’s defense.
It didn’t happen all at once, but slowly but surely FC Cincinnati tilted the scales until eventually everything went their way.
In the 42’ Kenji Mboma Dem picked a corner kick out of the air with a fade away header to the far post to level the score. Then, about five minutes later, FC Cincinnati took the lead. Pavel Bucha stepped up in defense to intercept a long pass from Orlando’s backline and carried it forward on the break. The Czech midfielder then picked out a brilliant cross field pass to Evander in open space, and the Brazilian would not be denied – shooting from distance and beating the keeper to the far post with a perfectly placed shot.
It wasn’t a perfect night, there were stumbles, and Orlando equalized out of the halftime break on a free kick effort, but from there it was all orange and blue.
FCC retook the lead in the 52’ and never looked back. Kenji Mboma Dem earned his first career brace off a sequence of passes started by Kévin Denkey and flowed through Evander. Then in the 58’ Evander dribbled into his kitchen (the space just above the top of the box just to the right of the semi-circle) and fired off his second goal of the night.
From there, the rout was on.
Kévin Denkey scored in the 77’ to make things 5-2 (on another assist from Evander) and Tom Barlow scored his career high fifth goal of the season in stoppage time to put the cherry on top and cap the 6-2 victory.
“Finally, we felt that we were us,” midfielder Pavel Bucha said after the match. “It was a great performance, great work from the team, and it's unlucky that now midseason break starts and we cannot continue in this momentum. But I'm glad that we go with positive energy for the break and hopefully after the break we will start where we finished.”
“This year hasn't been what we wanted it to be…but I feel like this puts us in a good spot going into the break,” Goalkeeper Roman Celentano, who made seven saves on nine shots Saturday, said of the victory. “Obviously, get the fans on our side, score a lot of goals, get something to cheer about, because you know we haven't made TQL as much of a fortress as we’ve wanted to this year. So I feel like tonight to kind of set that standard. ‘All right, this is our home, this is what we can do at home, this is what we can bring to you guys,’ and I think it's a good message to send to the fans home with going into the break.”
Evander played the starring role all night, contributing to five of the six FC Cincinnati goals directly and orchestrating the offense like Amadeus so that everyone could play a part in the success in one way or another. But what struck his coaches and teammates most about the breakout of two goals and three assists, which was only the 11th time in MLS history a player had five goal contributions in a single match.
“When he's on the ball, with space, everybody comes to life. You can feel it, the energy of the stadium, the energy that he provided with moving with the ball, with the one-v-one moments where he creates separation,” Noonan said of Evander’s performance. “For me, it's still about, at that moment, are guys ready to run? Are guys ready to run to goal? Because he will get you the ball.”
“His decision making in the final third was amazing tonight,” Bucha added of Evander. “When we get him on the ball in some open space, that's always very good for us.”
“He's taken his game to another level in this moment,” Noonan continued. “With production, with consistency in his play, and the scary thing is, there's more.”
The performances between the lines Saturday night weren’t the only record breaking ones either. With the victory, Head Coach Pat Noonan earned his 75th MLS regular season win, which makes him tied for fastest coach in league history to reach that milestone with Seattle Sounders FC Head Coach Brian Schmetzer.
“It's certainly humbling, and I'll take all Brian [Schmetzer]'s trophies,” Noonan said of the milestone, only kind of joking. “That's what we're doing this for, I want those trophies. So, the individual stuff is a credit to the people you work with, and consistency in our play, but I want the trophies.”
There were plenty of places to build from and things to improve, but the 6-2 domination set a positive tone to enter this long break. What things look like when FCC returns to action next, who knows. But this is a high you could ride for a long time.
“It was a really important night. We wanted to send (the fans) these messages that we're still together, we are still a strong team,” Evander said of the victory. “Of course, we need to adjust some small details, but we are still a team that wants to win and have big dreams for this season, so I think it was a good message for the fans, and also thank you to them for supporting us this season.”
FC Cincinnati now take a few weeks off before returning for a second preseason on June 22. One month later they’ll take to TQL Stadium again to restart the MLS season when they host Vancouver Whitecaps FC.
