For the Chicago Fire, 2021 marked a fourth straight season without qualifying for the playoffs. After finishing 22nd overall in 2020 with an average of 1.00 points claimed per game, the Fire where remarkably consistent with regards to being terrible in 2021, finishing 22nd overall with an average of 1.00 points per game.
Luka Stojanović drove home the tie-breaking goal in the third minute of stoppage time, and the visiting Chicago Fire stunned reeling FC Cincinnati with a 4-3 victory on Wednesday night.
Just two minutes after Cincinnati's Tyler Blackett clipped in a cross amid traffic to tie the match at 3-3, Stojanović drilled a laser from outside of the top of the box that just cleared the arm of leaping FCC goalkeeper Przemysław Tytoń. It's just the second road victory of the season for Chicago (8-16-7, 31 points), which like Cincinnati, has already been eliminated from playoff contention.
Carles Gil scored in the first minute of second-half stoppage time to give the New England Revolution a hard-fought 3-2 road win over the Chicago Fire on Wednesday night, clinching an MLS playoff spot in the process.
Gil's third goal of the season, assisted by Tajon Buchanan, went past Fire goalkeeper Gabriel Slonina and also gave the Revolution a franchise-record 18th win of the year.
They say size doesn't matter, but with the modern men's goalkeeping landscape populated by giants like Manuel Neuer (6-4), Gianluigi Donnarumma (6-5) and Thibaut Courtois (6-7), 6-2 is almost considered the minimum height for a professional goalkeeper in the modern age.
A few players, like Yann Sommer (6-0) and Jordan Pickford (6-1) buck this trend, but it is increasingly rare to see a men's keeper under 6-0, much less one who is 5-8 or 5-9.
Hany Mukhtar recorded the fastest hat trick in MLS history and Nashville SC extended their home unbeaten streak to 11 games with a 5-1 victory over the visiting Chicago Fire on Saturday night.
Mukhtar tallied all three goals in the first 16 minutes.
Mukhtar, who entered with a team-leading four goals, took advantage of breakdowns on Chicago's back end to open the scoring in the 10th minute, and he came through again three minutes later.
El calor ha llegado a la ciudad de Chicago y también ha llegado la muy necesitada victoria. El Chicago Fire venció en casa al Inter Miami con un marcador de 1-0, en un animado Soldier Field, que contó con un aforo de 10.844 asistentes al juego, superando por casi el doble a su anterior partido en casa contra el Philadelphia Union.
The heat has arrived in the city of Chicago, and so has a much-needed victory. The Chicago Fire defeated Inter Miami at home by a score of 1-0 on Saturday at a lively Soldier Field, which had a crowd of 10,844 in attendance for the game, beating their previous home match numbers against the Philadelphia Union by nearly double.
The year that was 2020 disrupted a lot of the financial models for Major League Soccer and resulted in a new Collective Bargaining Agreement ratified back in February, but the 26th season of MLS is now underway while looking largely similar to previous editions, particularly with regards to the MLS Designated Players list 2021.
The Chicago Fire kicked off its 2021 MLS season at Soldier Field, the club's original stadium where they mainly played between 1998 and 2005. The 2020 campaign was truly the team's return to this excellent stadium, but because of the COVID-19 pandemic, it was this season that saw the long-awaited inauguration with the heart and soul of the sport: the fans.
Ezequiel Barco and Emerson Hyndman each had goals to lead host Atlanta United to a 3-1 victory over Chicago Fire FC on Saturday night.
After not scoring in its MLS opener last week against Orlando City and mustering only two goals in three matches overall, Atlanta United (1-0-1, 4 points) found its offensive spark in front of a 50-percent capacity crowd in its home opener.