ORLANDO – Tally Hall knows what it takes to be an MLS Cup contender. After all, the former Houston Dynamo goalkeeper made two appearances in the final and one other deep playoff run in the space of four seasons, so he’s a good judge of what a competitive team looks and feels like.
And, after 17 games either watching or playing for his new team in Central Florida, he thinks Orlando City FC are beginning to look and feel a lot like just such a team.
The 30-year-old goalkeeper was sidelined for the first few months of the season from an ACL tear last August, but he has bounced back ahead of schedule and as good as ever, with eight successive appearances and only one defeat to date with the Lions.
Now, with the team about to embark on the second half of their season with a trip to Real Salt Lake on Saturday (10 pm ET; MLS LIVE) and with a solid place in the Eastern Conference playoff picture, Hall believes Orlando are firmly on course for their ambitious bid to become only the third expansion team to reach the postseason in their inaugural year.
“We have the talent, and we have the ability,” he said. “And if you look at the way we have played in our last six to seven games, I think we have showed our true potential.
“It’s a microcosm of the season, but if we continue to get performances like that when we are pulling out late goals to tie or win and kind of strange-but-tough wins on the road, these are the signs that make a good team become a great team.”
Orlando have only to look at the top of the conference for inspiration, and after three close games with D.C. United – a narrow win and two tough losses – they believe they are closing in on the grind-it-out mentality that makes Ben Olsen’s men so difficult to beat.
“Just look at D.C.,” Hall added. “If there is one thing that they are, it is opportunistic. We have a ton of talent on our team and, if we can continue to be opportunistic and take our chances, we are going to find ourselves competing in that big game at the end of the season.
“You have to have some bounces go your way, you have to have some luck, and sometimes you create that luck through the way you play. Through our recent run we have found a way to get lucky, but it is not luck when you are doing all the right things in the game.”
Hall also believes the ups and downs of the first half of the season have served the team well in terms of building the right chemistry and will to win.
“I am looking at us and already seeing the right things when it comes to being competitive at playoff level,” he said. “And I think we can really turn some heads when it comes to the second half of the season – and into the postseason.”
And that’s true when evaluating his own game, Hall said. Despite two clean sheets in his last three games, Hall thinks he is still not 100-percent back to his best after nine months on the sidelines with his knee injury.
“I don’t think I am there yet,” he said. “I still think I can get better with my game management. I am getting more comfortable with seeing games out, but I still have moments when I think, ‘Is it the right time to play the ball out, or do I need to make a pass?’ Sometimes I think I should have had more patience on the ball.
“The most important thing is that being an athlete is a season-long commitment, and I still think I am not at my optimum point yet for 2015. I didn’t get the preseason work that everyone else did, hence I still feel I’m playing catch-up a bit.”
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Ever the perfectionist, Hall remains unconvinced by some of his recent work, even though he has suffered only one loss in purple since he took over from Donovan Ricketts on May 17 in a 4-0 rout of the LA Galaxy.
“There are times when I get a shutout, and still look back and see things I could have done better and that I wasn’t as good as I could be for the team,” the ‘keeper added. “That’s the way I approach the game. It is fun to play soccer for a living, but it is my job and everything that I work towards.
“I don’t like making mistakes, big or small. That’s one of the reasons where I am, and that’s the level of responsibility I put on myself.”
