BY ANTHONY ZILIS
Last week, the Fire ended a 10-game winless streak by beating Toronto FC 2-0.
This week, they showed it was no fluke, beating the defending MLS Cup champion Colorado Rapids 2-0 at Toyota Park.
“We’ve got a lot of great players, I think we’re finally jelling as a team. It’s taken way too many ties to learn that lesson. Luckily we didn’t learn it too late,” said Fire goalkeeper Sean Johnson, who posted his fifth clean sheet of the season.
“To be able to build on last week against Toronto, to turn around against Colorado and keep that momentum, that was huge. Granted, the Rapids were playing their fifth game in 15 days.
Still, a Fire team which hadn’t won two straight in league play since April of 2010 will take what it can get.
Dominic Oduro scored his ninth goal of the season in the 17th minute after he surged past defender Drew Moor to get on the end of a Pavel Pardo pass and beat Matt Pickens from the edge of the box. The goal was Oduro’s fourth in five games.
“Before the game (Pavel) told me, look out for me, any time I see you in space, I’m putting in a ball,” said Oduro.
The goal was Oduro’s fourth in five games, just one less than his career high for an entire season.
Cory Gibbs doubled the Fire’s total in the 35th minute, heading home a Sebastian Grazzini cross.
The Rapids finally thought they were on the board in 89th minute when Macoumba Kandji scored off of a Sanna Nyassi rebound, but Nyassi was called offside.
Colorado was riding a nine-game unbeaten streak coming into Saturday, but a midweek trip to El Salvador for a Champions League game against Real Espana may have proved too much.
“We had a long couple of weeks as a team,” midfielder Jeff Larentowicz said. “I think we were lethargic early on and they made us pay for it. When you travel here against a team that has found some form, it’s going to be difficult.”
The win puts the Fire just five points out of playoff contention with seven games left. They just hope their surge didn’t happen too late in the season.
“I knew we were going to come out and play well because of all of the work that’s been done in training this week. The guys are sharp, the mentality was good,” Fire coach Frank Klopas said. “The guys, let me tell you something, they’re not happy with where the team is at the moment. It’s just one game, the guys are not satisfied.”
Don’t forget, it’s not like the Fire are 20 games under .500. They are 4-7-15. If you take the ties out of the equation and just go by win/loss (which is usually how percentages are calculated) the Fire aren’t that far under .500. For the record, I don’t like the MLS playoff system either, but this is not like the NFL where a 7-9 Seattle team can make the playoffs.
The problem is not team fatigue for colorado, the problem is the coach. Wonderful players but coach smith do not know how to use them. mac kandji is not a bench player mac is aplay maker.Is no denfense that can handle omar, kandji and nyassi. Caoch smith has the tools to win but to said he do not kwon how to used
lol sbi is rong
Wow. Feathers ruffled much? LOL And you’re accusing people of being “juvenile and amateur in attitude/delivery”!
You might want to consider that “just sayin'” might just mean, you know, “just sayin'”. Or that my comments were precisely relevant to the point under discussion. OTOH, if you get that annoyed by any answers you perceive not to be 100% in keeping with your views, or to be precisely of the same perspective that you have (even when they are!), posting on Internet forums may not be for you…
just saying….hello
Whether or not it’s “anything new” wasn’t my point, nor is it justifiable as reason to sweep it under the rug.
It’s alarming that a club that’s played so poorly, for nearly the entire season, can get hot for a couple weeks and win the most prestigious trophy our league has. I think it every year but these types of scenario’s are a jagged pill to swallow as a supporter of the league.
Sidenote: Maybe it’s just me, but no matter how insightful someone’s opinion and eloquent someone’s thoughts appear to be, when it’s followed by “just sayin'”….it renders to a state that I generally just ignore the overall message.
It just strikes me as juvenile and amateur in attitude/delivery. Unless, thats what people who use it are going for.
Well I wasn’t responding to you, actually… I chimed in specifically because of mistadobolina’s reference to sub-.500 teams making the playoffs. If we’ve already had one such team not only make the playoffs but go all the way to a win in MLS Cup, and do so prior to the expansion of the playoffs, to boot, then what you guys are referring to really isn’t anything new. That’s all I was “just sayin'” (which in fact is why I added “just sayin'” at the end of the comment).
Don’t get me wrong — I am not enamored of the system, either. But the old system was about as bad, so it’s just been a fact of life in MLs for a long time, now (like bad reffing, inconsistent league decisions, less than stellar attendance…).
…and you’re only further proving my point. “Just saying…”
Bingo.
Getting hot at just the right time, these guys could be dangerous if they play well enough to make the playoffs.
RSL was a sub-.500 MLS Cup winner 2 seasons before the league expanded the playoff system to 10 teams. Just sayin’…
its never good when teams that are below .500 are making playoff pushes. makes the reg season kind of pointless.
My club or not:
The mere fact that Chicago can still make the playoffs (and have a fighters chance at winning the leagues most prized trophy….MLS Cup), is a terrible indictment on our league playoff system.
To call it a joke would be a compliment, for the words that are coming to mind.
I think most of the stuff I’ve seen says that Klopas isn’t sure if he really wants to remain the head coach no matter how they do.
(SBI-It really isn’t up to him AT ALL. People suggesting that or implying that just don’t know how things are actually being handled in Chicago.)
if Chicago can finish out strong will Klopas still be coach?