Chicago Fire FC (3-4-7, 16 points) battled the New England Revolution (7-3-4, 25 points) to a 3-3 draw at Gillette Stadium on Saturday night.
Playing their seventh match in the last three weeks, the Fire raced ahead to an early two-goal lead in the first half, but conceded a pair of goals to enter the halftime break level, 2-2. The two sides would exchange goals late in the second half to earn a point each.
Ten minutes into the match, Chicago won a ball in their half and midfielder Xherdan Shaqiri scanned the field for a target. Shaqiri sent a perfectly-weighted ball behind the Revolution defense for forward Georgios Koutsias. The young forward ran onto the pass, taking a couple of controlling passes toward the goal before placing his shot past the goalkeeper and into the lower left corner. With his goal, Koutsias became the third player under the age of 20 to score in back-to-back matches for the Fire, along with Jhon Durán and Justin Mapp.
Koutsias was a key part of the second goal in the 22nd minute, when he played a pass up the left flank for Miguel Navarro. The quick Venezuelan cut a pass across the goalmouth that bounced off Andrew Farrell and redirected into the net.
New England pulled even just before halftime with goals in the 38th and 40th minutes. Revolution midfielder Noel Buck put one past Homegrown goalkeeper Chris Brady with a big shot from outside the box in the 38th minute. Two minutes later, Bobby Wood, who assisted on Buck’s goal, sent the ball sailing to the back of the net off a header from the center of the box.
Brady kept the score level in the 55th minute when Giacomo Vrioni found himself one-on-one with the young ’keeper. Vrioni squared up and Brady made himself big, saving the shot with his foot.
In the 79th minute, second-half substitute Brian Gutiérrez controlled the ball on the left side, sending a pass across the box for Kei Kamara. The forward kept it going right, sending a low pass to Haile-Selassie making a run on the right. The midfielder placed it low for his third goal of the season.
New England also scored a third via Jozy Altidore in the 83rd minute. The result marks the Fire’s second consecutive 3-3 draw in League play, as the team extended its unbeaten run to three matches across all competitions.
NEXT MATCH: Chicago heads up North to face Toronto FC at 6:30 p.m. CT on Wednesday, May 31 at BMO Field. The match will be broadcast on Apple TV+, streamed in English on wlsam.com, and transmitted locally in Spanish on TUDN 1200 AM.
Social: Twitter - @chicagofire, @vamosfire (Hashtags: #CF97 #VamosFire) | Instagram - @chicagofire | Facebook
Notes:
- Greek forward Georgios Koutsas scored his second goal in a Fire shirt in his first-ever MLS start. Koutsias, who scored his first MLS and Chicago Fire goal in the 89th minute of the 3-3 tie with Atlanta United, scored in consecutive MLS matches for the first time in his career.
- Winger Maren Haile-Selassie scored his third goal of the season and his fourth across all competitions. Three of Haile-Selassie’s goals have come in the Club’s last five matches.
- Swiss international midfielder Xherdan Shaqiri tallied an assist for a third straight match. The Fire’s No. 10 has provided four assists in the team’s last five matches.
- Forward Kei Kamara notched his first career assist for the Fire.
- Unbeaten in their last three matches across all competitions, the Fire have scored eight goals during that stretch.
- Midfielder Jairo Torres returned to the starting XI for the first time since leaving the field with a first-half injury in the Fire’s first game of the season against NYCFC on March 4.
- Goalkeeper Chris Brady backstopped the group, manning the net in his 12th start of the season.
- Defenders Jonathan Dean (left upper leg), Carlos Terán (right knee) and Justin Reynolds (left upper leg), midfielders Fabian Herbers (yellow card accumulation), Chris Mueller (hip), Federico Navarro (red card suspension) and Sergio Oregel Jr. (right lower leg) and forward Victor Bezerra (left upper leg) were unavailable for selection tonight.
Box Score:
New England Revolution 3:3 Chicago Fire FC
Goals:
CHI - Koutsias (2) (Shaqiri, 3) (WATCH) 10’
CHI - Andrew Farrell (Own Goal) (WATCH) 22’
NE - Noel Buck (2) (Wood, 3) (WATCH) 38’
NE - Wood (4) (Makoun, 1) (WATCH) 40’
CHI - Haile-Selassie (3) (Kamara, 1) (WATCH) 79’
NE - Altidore (1) (Romney, 1) (WATCH) 83’
Discipline:
CHI - Torres (Yellow Card) 47’
NE - Blessing (Yellow Card) 50’
NE - Jones (Yellow Card) 90’
CHI - Brady (Yellow Card) 90+2’
Chicago Fire FC: GK Brady, D Omsberg, D Pineda (Czichos, 61’), D Burks (Souquet, 73’), D M. Navarro, M Torres (Gutiérrez, 67’), M Giménez, M Haile-Selassie, M Shaqiri (capt). F Koutsias (Aceves, 73’), F Przybyłko (Kamara, 62’)
Subs not used: GK Richey, M Casas Jr., F Monis, F Rodríguez
New England Revolution: GK Petrovic, D Romney, D Makoun, D Jones, D Farrell (capt.), M Polster, M Boateng (Rennicks, 81’), M Blessing (Gil, 62’), M Buck, F Vrioni, F Wood (Altidore, 81’)
Subs not used: GK Edwards Jr., D Gonzalez, D Sweat, M Bolma, M Panayotou, F Bajraktarevic
Stats Summary: NE / CHI
Shots: 16 / 9
Shots on Goal: 6 / 3
Saves: 1 / 3
Passing Accuracy: 84.6% / 82.8%
Corners: 9 / 4
Fouls: 14 / 4
Offsides: 1 / 0
Possession: 52.6% / 47.4%
Attendance: 27,293
Referee: Malik Badawi
Assistant Referees: Nick Uranga, Kevin Lock
Fourth Official: Armando Villarreal
VAR: Ramy Touchan
Asst. VAR: Joshua Patlak
Chicago Fire FC Head Coach Frank Klopas
On the changes to tonight’s starting lineup and his thoughts on the team’s performance…
“Yeah, it's the third game in a week. So obviously like I said before the game, we had to assess certain guys, how they were. You know, we made the changes necessary but the changes were made in a positive way. We came on the road and we scored two goals, three goals.
Yeah, I felt the first 35 minutes into the game, I felt we dominated the game. We had an excellent performance being up 2-0 and then you know, momentum changed, obviously giving up those two goals right before the half.
And in the second half, look, we suffered a little bit, but then we found a way in certain moments to get the third goal and then they equalized late.
You know, they had chances, also. We can't take that away. They had chances in the second half. But you know it's a little bit bitter feeling right now because you scored three goals on the road and in the end you look at it and say, okay, with the chances they had, it's a fair result but it's a little bit bitter with the goals that we gave up.
You know, taking a point on the road against a team like this, normally you feel really good, and we still do but kind of feel like we left points here. But in the end, look, they also had chances. So fair result, but kind of bitter.”
On using a three-man backline…
“It's just the way we wanted to build our play up in possession. They had two forwards. We had the advantage in the back with the three. We boxed the midfield. They were in a diamond in the first 35, 40 minutes. We had the advantage, playing out of the back. We always set the advantage in the middle with our pivots. When we played that and we switched the point of attack, we always set really good triangles and numerical advantage once we moved the ball. And yeah, for me, there was no issue with that at all.”
On Georgios Koutsias’ performance in his first MLS start…
“Look, we knew that we'd have opportunities in transition. It's something that we talked about and we prepared in our game plan.
And you know, once we got the ball with Shaq [Xherdan Shaqir] and they pushed numbers forward, and then our ability in transition to break the first line, and if we could find Shaq where he was able to turn and have runs behind, we knew we would get opportunities like that.
You know, great start. He had a very good game obviously, and a great finish there. But he helped the team. He worked extremely hard. He's just going to continue to develop and get better and better. We used him out wide almost as a second forward coming in, and yeah, he showed a lot of composure with that finish. You see his pace, getting behind.
So he's a young player that's going to grow and he definitely doesn't lack confidence, like I said, and obviously scored two goals now in two games, his first start. He did really well, and he's just got to continue to push in the right way, and he's just going to get better and better.”
On Maren Haile-Selassie’s ability to play in multiple positions…
“Yeah, Maren [Haile-Selassie] has obviously got a lot of pace. He's got the ability to cover the width. At some times, he needs to drop a little bit deeper and that was the game plan because we wanted to force [Emmanuel] Boateng to come inside.
We didn't want him receiving the ball where he can face our back line. Maren being a little bit deeper, forcing him inside in the pockets, he was not a threat at that point because then Kendall [Burks] did a great job with him picking him up.
Maren also has the ability now when we win the ball with his pace in transition, you have Shaq on that side, their ability to rotate with Shaq comes at times wide. He comes inside in the half channels, and he's just a really dangerous player, a really good two-way player where he does it without the ball helping the team; but then his ability to get forward with pace, he's a very good one-on-one player and has the ability to finish and make the final pass. So it's great for us. His addition has been excellent.
And with [Mauricio] Pineda, it's a concussion protocol. I think they evaluated it, the doctors did, and now he's in that protocol. We have to see day-to-day, I don't know what -- how long he's going to be out but just hope it doesn't -- I not that long but he's done a concussion protocol.”