Welcome to your match thread for a Mother’s Day match-up between Orlando City (3-4-3, 12 points) and Atlanta United (4-3-2, 14 points) at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. It’s the first of two scheduled Southeast Showdowns (*must credit The Mane Land PawedCast) between the Eastern Conference rivals this season.
It can’t be called a rivalry until Orlando City gets on the board in this series, so the Lions will need to pull off an upset to create one. Atlanta got off to a sluggish start in the post-Tata Martino and post-Miguel Almiron era but seems to have righted the ship just in time for Orlando to come calling, because that’s how these things work.