ORLANDO – Paul McDonough is not regretting “the one that got away” after a busy week of wheeling and dealing during the final days of the summer transfer window, despite failing to land the big-name star that many were expecting.
And, while the “big splash” that Orlando City SC majority owner Flavio Augusto da Silva hinted at last month never materialized, the team remains poised for bigger things further down the line.
That was the message on Friday from the Lions general manager, who was one of the busiest people in town all week as he worked to improve the league newcomers’ roster for a playoff push in the final 11 weeks of the season.
Lions fans were hopeful one of the new arrivals would be a certain Mexican striker who goes by the nickname of "Little Pea", but Manchester United’s Javier Hernandez has opted to stay in the Premier League, at least for now.
“Through the course of the [transfer] window, the club had the authority to go out and try to find an impactful player,” McDonough said. “Our understanding was that if we could find the right guy, we had the authorization to get it done.
“But some things didn’t pan out, and we needed to make a decision that would help us both in the short-term but also the longer term. It may look like we settled for a lesser option, but it leaves us free to do more impactful things in future.”
Instead of Chicharito, former Columbus Crew SC striker Adam Bedell arrived in Central Florida, adding to the European signings of Spanish defender David Mateos from Hungarian side Ferencvaros and right-sided midfielder Adrian Winter from Luzern in Switzerland.
In all, Orlando added five new players, along with trades for Corey Ashe (from Houston) and Servando Carrasco (Sporting Kansas City), while four have moved on, namely Amobi Okugo, Donovan Ricketts, Sean St Ledger and Martin Paterson.
Orlando have steadfastly refused to elaborate on why defender St Ledger was waived last week, other than for “a serious breach of club policy,” while the departure of striker Paterson back to Britain “by mutual consent” was another surprise.
“We didn’t plan on the St Ledger and Paterson situation at the end of the window,” McDonough said. “But I think we have added the right pieces. We certainly have a more diverse range of options for [head coach] Adrian Heath now.”
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Winter and Bedell both trained with the team on Friday and will be available for duty in Saturday’s home clash with Philadelphia (7:30 pm ET; MLS LIVE) that is rapidly taking on a must-win feel for City after recent defeats by both New York teams and Toronto that have left them outside the playoff positions – despite last Saturday’s emphatic 5-2 beating of Columbus.
Mateos received his international player visa on Friday morning and will fly in on Saturday in time for a full training week ahead of a tough Aug. 16 trip to Seattle.
“We are happy with what we’ve done in the window,” McDonough added. “In the short term, we took the approach that we added quality to our squad and we freed up cap space that allows us to be aggressive in making major changes going forward. We didn’t want to settle for something that we might have regretted in December.
“The big thing for us in the near future is getting guys back on the field again after injury. When we get the likes of Brek Shea, Rafa Ramos and Carlos Rivas back, I think we will be pretty happy with this group.”
