NASHVILLE, TN—Ten days ago, the Fire showed they could come from behind and win. On Saturday, they showed they could squander any momentum from that win as they were shredded, 5-1, by Nashville SC. Nashville extends their unbeaten streak to five with their biggest margin of victory in their young MLS history.
All the damage came in a six-minute span and they were helped at times by the Fire’s mental freezes in defense. Ten minutes in, Johan Kappelhof cheaply gave away a ball to CJ Sapong who fed Hany Mokhtar for an easy finish. Mukhtar would score three minutes later shooting between two defenders beating Bobby Shuttleworth near post.
It got worse a minute later for the Fire as Kappelhof would be sent off for taking down CJ Sapong in a denial of a goal scoring opportunity. Mokhtar would score on the ensuing free kick to complete his hat trick–the fastest from the start of a match in MLS history and the second quickest in terms of span at six minutes.
To add insult to injury, Sapong would score against his former team in the 39th minute.
Ignacio Aliseda pulled one back for the Fire in the 47th minute, but Tah Anunga would complete the Fire’s misery with a rocket shot from outside the area.
Fire head coach Raphael Wicky missed Saturday’s match and will miss Wednesday’s at home to DC United (7pm, WGN-TV) due to a family emergency in Switzerland. Assistant Frank Klopas took control on an interim basis.
“Listen, right now at the moment, I think the first thing that’s on my mind and the team’s mind and the whole club and organization is with Rapha and his family, and our thoughts, our prayers are with him. So that’s just the first thing that’s going through my mind right now,” said Klopas.
“And then the second thing is, look, I think when I look at this game, you cannot have a start like that. The first 15 minutes, I thought the game was over. We had a poor start, we go down 2-0 and you get a red card. That’s the difficult one.”
If there is any takeaway from Saturday’s match according to Gaston Gimenez, it’s that the Fire have to be focused from the opening kickoff to the final whistle–something this team has had trouble with the past year plus.
“The truth is that it was very difficult, but what did we take away from it? We take away that we’re a team who needs to be focused from minute zero until the very end,” said Gimenez. “We can’t start off the game sleepy like we did today because that’s something that we pay for dearly, which we have seen before and we certainly saw tonight.
“So we need to be completely focused from minute zero, from the very first minute, until the very end, especially because the game that’s coming up is also a very difficult game. It’s going to be a very physical game, and we’re going to be home, and so we need to win.
And we just need to go in and keep focused, keep concentrating because we are going to be at home, and we just have to keep believing in what we have been doing.”
The Fire return home to play DC United for a 7pm kickoff on WGN-TV.
SCORING SUMMARY:
NSH-Hany Mukhtar (Sapong) 10
NSH-Hany Mukhtar (Lovitz) 13
NSH-Hany Mukhtar (unassisted) 16
NSH-CJ Sapong (Leal) 39
CHI-Ignacio Aliseda (Frankowski) 47
NSH-Tah Anunga (Nealis) 62
BOOKING SUMMARY:
CHI-Johan Kappelhof (sent off, denial of goalscoring opportunity) 14
CHI-Mauricio Pineda (caution, tactical foul) 27
CHI-Miguel Navarro (caution, unsporting behavior) 50
NASHVILLE SC (3-4-1-2): #1-Joe Willis; #5-Jack Maher, #3-Jalil Anibaba, #4-David Romney; #18-Dylan Nealis, #6-Dax McCarty (#22-Matt LaGrassa 65), #27-Tah Anunga (#26-Luke Haakenson 74), #2-Daniel Lovitz; #8-Randall Leal (#7-Abu Danladi 74); #17-CJ Sapong (#99-Jhonder Cadiz 67), #10-Hany Mukhtar (#19-Alex Muyl 65)
Subs not used: #35-Brian Meredith, #15-Eric Miller, #23-Taylor Washington, #14-Daniel Rios
CHICAGO FIRE (3-5-2): #1-Bobby Shuttleworth; #4-Johan Kappelhof, #22-Mauricio Pineda, #20-Wyatt Omsberg; #2-Boris Sekulic, #11-Przemyslaw Frankowski, #10-Alvaro Medran (#8-Luka Stojanovic 67), #21-Fabian Herbers (#30-Gaston Gimenez 46), #6-Miguel Navarro (#3-Jonathan Bornstein 67); #7-Ignacio Aliseda (#14-Jhon Espinoza 82), #27-Robert Beric (#9-Chinoso Offor 46)
Subs not used: #32-Gabriel Slonina, #28-Elliot Collier, #40-Brian Gutierrez, #38-Alex Monis
TOTAL SHOTS: NSH 25-14 CHI
SHOTS ON GOAL: NSH 12-4 CHI
FOULS: NSH 14-9 CHI
OFFSIDES: NSH 2-0 CHI
CORNER KICKS: NSH 7-4 CHI
SAVES: NSH 3-7 CHI
Referee: Lukasz Szpala
Assistant Referees: Ian Anderson, Cameron Blanchard
4th Official: Tori Penso
VAR: Kevin Stott
Weather: Partly Cloudy and 85º
Attendance: 23,113
Man of the Match: Hany Mokhtar (NSH)
