A Four-Gettable Night in More Ways than One for the Fire

Chicago Fire FC 0-4 Real Salt Lake

CHICAGO, IL—There’s no other way to describe Saturday night as a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad one for Chicago Fire FC. It felt like everything, everywhere all at one as they fell 4-0 to Real Salt Lake matching their worst home defeat ever. Worse, four players went out due to injuries including one during warmups. 

Xherdan Shaqiri (right) was one of four players who left injured during Saturday’s match (Photo: Leslie Smith)

Brian Gutierrez was due to start on Saturday, but pulled up during warmups as Federico Navarro took his place in the lineup. Xherdan Shaqiri would also experience hamstring troubles and would be subbed off in the 24th minute. Navarro would make it to halftime, but a knee injury meant Gaston Gimenez would come in for him. Gimenez would last just 15 minutes before his hamstring gave way and Tom Barlow had to come in. 

It was a match the Fire were never in from the start. Andres Gomez opened the scoring in the 24th minute after given so much space and time after collecting a cross from Alexandros Katranis. Chicho Arango upped his goal total to eight in a five-minute span with help from the Fire defense.

Navarro played a back pass right to Arango for the first goal and then Arango was left totally unmarked on a corner kick in the 38th minute. Arango would assist on the final goal in the evening in stoppage time for Diego Luna to complete the misery for the Fire who fall to 13th in the East after this loss. 

’It’s just from one bad thing to the other, and it just seemed you can never get a grasp of thegame or when we had chances, when we got in certain moments, even when we pushed the game with a second forward and third forward, we really didn’t get any really crystal-clear chances. So it just

snowballed from there,” said Fire head coach Frank Klopas. 

“We have to reflect, review the game, but I think it’s one that, how quickly can weput it behind us and regroup? The bad thing about it is that we have four guys that went out today. That’s a tough one, you know? With

[Gutiérrez, Shaqiri] and then [Federico Navarro], with his knee, and then you put Gastón [Giménez] and his hamstring coming in. So it’s a difficult one.

I think they’re all muscle injuries and the only big question is with [Navarro] because of his knee. He stepped, I think, wrong and then he got hit. So that’s always a big question mark and a scary one to assess.”

The next Fire game will be at home against Atlanta United when they will honor former goalkeeper Zach Thornton as he becomes the latest inductee to the Ring of Fire. It may end up being the highlight of the entire season after Saturday and for the Fire Faithful, there have been far too few highlights the last 15 years. 

SCORING SUMMARY:
RSL-Andres Gomez (Katranis) 24
RSL-Chicho Arango (unassisted) 33
RSL-Chicho Arango (Oviedo) 38
RSL-Diego Luna (Arango) 90+3

BOOKING SUMMARY:
CHI-Kelyn Acosta (caution, tactical foul) 15
RSL-Andres Gomez (caution, delaying a restart) 31

CHICAGO FIRE (4-2-3-1):  #34-Chris Brady; #27-Allan Arigoni, #5-Rafael Czichos, #4-Carlos Teran, #2-Arnaud Soquet; #31-Federico Navarro (#30-Gaston Gimenez 46; #12-Tom Barlow 60), #23-Kelyn Acosta; #21-Fabian Herbers, #10-Xherdan Shaqiri (#19-Georgios Koutsias 28), #8-Chris Mueller; #9-Hugo Cuypers

Subs not used:  #18-Spencer Richey, #15-Andrew Gutman, #16-Wyatt Omsberg, #22-Mauricio Pineda, #24-Jonathan Dean

REAL SALT LAKE (4-2-3-1):  #35-Gavin Beavers; #98-Alexandros Katranis (#26-Phillip Quinton 73), #3-Bryan Oviedo, #19-Bode Hidalgo, #2-Andrew Brody; #6-Braian Ojeda (#13-Nelson Palacio 73), #11-Andres Gomez (#8-Diego Luna 56); #17-Fidel Barajas (#16-Maikel Change 82), #16-Emeka Enali, #25-Matt Crooks (#29-Anderson Julio 82); #9-Chicho Arango

Subs not used:  #18-Zac MacMath, #72-Zavier Gozo, #42-Keller Storlie

EXPECTED GOALS:  CHI 1.54-3.08 RSL
TOTAL SHOTS:  CHI 12-16 RSL
SHOTS ON GOAL:  CHI 2-7 RSL
FOULS:  CHI 15-13 RSL
OFFSIDES:  CHI 2-0 RSL
CORNER KICKS:  CHI 5-5 RSL
SAVES:  CHI 1-5 RSL

Referee:  Marcos de Oliveria
Assistant Referees:  Jose Da Silva, Adam Wienckowski
Fourth Official:  Calin Radosav
VAR:  Joe Dickerson
AVAR:  Claudiu Badea
Weather:  Cloudy and 46º
Attendance:  14,247
Man of the Match: Chicho Arango (RSL)