The Deep Dish: Road Dogs
One team is moving the arrow upwards while one team remains rooted to the bottom of their league. Let’s begin.
FIRE: Last season marked the first time that the Fire had back-to-back away wins for the first time in nine years. Last Saturday saw the Fire accomplish that feat again with a well-composed 1-0 win over Sporting Kansas City. Now, the challenge is to avoid doing what they did after winning consecutive road games last season, and that was go 2-5-3 the rest of the year.
The first improvement the Fire made was to go with four at the back after shipping many an untimely goal with a three center back setup. Brian Gutierrez anchoring the attacking midfield is working again. Fabian Herbers and Jairo Torres have had their two best games of the season. Finally, Chris Brady has come up big in these last two games.
Now, the Fire set out to do what they have not done in 14 years, and that’s win a third successive road match in league play. They were near the bottom of the table, but it’s wins like these that make fans think a playoff berth is possible. However, they need to sustain this momentum for the rest of the season to avoid the things like last year that make fans think another rebuild is necessary.
DOUMBIA ON HIS WAY: Continuing with the exchange between the Fire and sister club FC Lugano, Ousmane Doumbia is set to join the Fire soon as a designated player for the rest of the season. The Ivorian midfielder joined FC Lugano in 2022 and has made 35 appearances for the club and 65 with FC Zurich prior to that.
“I think it’s all about having options, you know, at the moment, and you know, we brought in a young player in (Georgios)Koutsias. We have two strikers that are there. If there was the right person to bring in that position, I think as a Club that wants to improve and get better, I think we are always looking to bring someone, whether it’s a nine or in the midfield. At that time, there were discussions to do so,” said Fire head coach Frank Klopas after Saturday’s match.
“(Ousmane) Doumbia is a very good player. When you look at him, even before he joined FC Lugano, in Zurich he was a big part of their team when they won the championship there. He’s a solid player. He’ll bring a lot of experience. He’s a guy that’s played minutes. He’s very smart. He’s good on the ball. He covers a lot of ground, and you know, I think he’s just going to add more quality to our team, and so I think I’m excited to have him, and now if we can add one more piece, that would be great.”
Fire sporting director Georg Heitz hinted at possibly another signing in the summer transfer window with Chris Mueller on the season-ending injury list in an interview with The Athletic.
RED STARS: The Red Stars remain rooted to the bottom of the NWSL with a 2-1 loss on Sunday at Gotham FC. They will host San Diego Wave on Saturday at 7pm on Paramount+. They do have two players going the Women’s World Cup in Australia and New Zealand starting on July 20th. Alyssa Naeher will be in her third World Cup for the USA while Cheyna Mattews will represent Jamaica for the second time.
