PawedCast Episode 74: Interview with Orlando City Defender Donny Toia

The off-season is just about over and, as such, this is our final monthly installment of the Mane Land PawedCast. That’s right, regular weekly service resumes the first week of March. And what a close to the off-season we’ve got for you. New Lions defender Donny Toia makes his PawedCast debut.

Toia was kind enough to answer my questions about how he found out he was heading to Orlando City, what it takes to settle into a new team, playing right back vs. left back, and much more. Donny was gracious with his responses and this is an interview you won’t want to miss.

We also discuss just how much the preseason matters, the injury issues Orlando City faces at right back, the Pride season openers and players involved in the SheBelieves and Algarve Cup competitions, Tommy Redding’s work with the U.S. U-20s, and a host of other topics, many of which survived a technical gremlin that crept into the closing stages of the first segment.

Here’s how the show shook out:

0:12- Does preseason matter? What kind of depth can we expect on opening day? What about the team’s shape? These questions were wrestled with before the technical issue.

15:48- Donny Toia jumps in and accepts a little good-natured ribbing about scoring his 2015 goal against Orlando City. He also answered every question we threw at him.

32:30- Pride news, OCB, the USWNT, the U.S. U-20 team, and a rundown of important upcoming dates.

And that’s another show. We’ll be back in March with the weekly “in-season” schedule.