Here’s To False Spring 💐

Here we are two matches into the Gregg Berhalter era and it's feeling a little WARM outside 🤝

Springtime - Theodore Rousseau c 1860 (The Art Institute of Chicago)

What The Hell:

"Tus mait, leath na hoibre." (A good start, half the battle.)

Listen, this isn’t how this was supposed to start. 

Combos, Miller High-Lifes, karaoke, the first Chicago false spring, and an open patio give even the best of us the opportunity to betray our best intentions. 

One second you’re meeting up with your two friends to do a rundown of your inaugural Chicago Fire podcast episode, the timing perfectly lined up with the start of Gregg Berhalter’s tenure as Manager and Director of Football with a (extremely fun and clever, NOT cheesy) name to boot. You've got a little tavern style pie ready for pickup and you’ll start a rewatch after you have a beer or two at the bar to get the juices flowing. 

The next minute your girlfriend looks on as you perform a substandard rendition of Semi-Charmed Life with your pal, totally unprepared for the upcoming question “so how did the podcast recording go?”

One second your name’s Phillip Zinkernagel and you're enjoying life on loan with the best team in Norway. Shit is sweet and even if Club Brugge doesn’t extend your deal at the end of the 2025, there will be plenty of mid-tier European clubs in for a technical winger of your caliber. 

Next, you’re tempted by a call from your agent saying a BIG MARKET team in the United States is interested in your services with the former U.S. Men’s National team head coach at the helm. A little payday and U.S. vacay (summer-time Chi baby) sounds seductive, and boom, it’s 20 degrees in Columbus, Ohio and you’re getting pressed into fucking hell by Wilfried Nancy’s Crew. Life comes at you fast. 

We all have the opportunity to beat ourselves with the allure of temptation (playing out from the back). But we also have a chance at redemption (someday doing it well). 

What We Learned:

The Gregg Berhalter era is officially underway in Chicago and honestly, there’s a lot of positives to take away. Six goals shipped in your first two matches isn’t fun, but a majority of them were self-inflicted and the Fire certainly look like they have a philosophy of how they’re going to play in possession. My favorite instance of this was around the 30’ mark during the Crew game. Someone with access to Mediabank clip this for me please please please. 

Anyway, here’s the gist. Before you dive into this, grab a drink, and get comfy - it’s a long one. (You can also just fire up MLS Season Pass and skip to 29:30 of the Crew match.)

Jack Elliott stops and clears a Crew shot out to a streaking Zinkernagel on the right. Phil assesses his options in transition, slows it down and opts to retain possession rather than try anything risky (Bamba’s hands are UP, he wanted that bad boi played quick). He lays it off to midfielder Sergi Oregal, in the midst of his first MLS start and Sergi plays a quick back and forth with El Capitano, Kellyn Acosta, near the center circle before sliding play back over to the left. His pass slips across to Elliott who has stepped up and has eyes downfield. 

If the passing of time isn’t obvious, Columbus is now totally back into a mid-block and comfy in their rest defense. 

Elliott scans and instead defers the ball laterally to his centerback partner Carlos Teran. Teran hits Acosta who’s dropped a little and the pair play the ball back and forth twice, drawing defenders in before flipping it over to Sergi who’s also dropped to Carlo’s right, rotating to where you’d expect to see a RB. Pressure immediately comes to Sergi which Acosta recognizes. The captain flys over, shows for the ball, receives and quickly moves it to the actual RB Jonathan Dean who’s hugging the right touchline nearby. Dean goes back to Sergi who lays it off to Kellyn who’s running back toward the left and is bringing a defender with him and Columbus' press advances while the Fire’s CB’s retreat a bit.

Kellyn fires the ball to Teran, who plays it along to Elliott who’s eyes immediately look upfield again. What he sees is Crew forward Jacen Russell-Rowe right in front of him. The Crew’s press is out of a midblock and now has seven players in the Fire’s half of the field. What Elliott also see’s is a certain Brian Guitierez who has found a pocket of space in the middle of these seven Crew invaders and he quickly hits him to start the Fire attack. Guti received the ball so well in the midfield and within a second he released a sprinting Jonathan Bamba down the left.

The spread out Crew press is now flying back while Bamba gets to the edge of the 18 and crosses it to Hugo Cuypers settled right near the Crew’s pk spot. He holds it up for a second and probably should’ve laid it off for an oncoming Zinkernagel but instead tries an unbalanced shot that hits the defender in front of him and bounces harmlessly to the Crews keeper. The beautiful passage of play in the end amounts to nothing but wow did that plant a seed in my mind.

To me, this was art. It’s equivalent to this and this.

I’m sure at this moment Gregg on the sideline (he’s got that shit on, ID check on the Goose please) was feeling pretty good watching his team execute a sliver of his vision. 

Gregg mentions in his postgame press conference his goal was to create overloads and as you can see, the Fire reaaaaaally liked that left side. Bamba was bombing down the left side all game and he and left back Andrew Gutman looked awesome in transition together (you can see here Guti saw this and didn’t want to be left out). 

These first 30 minutes were so sick. Brian Gutierez brace and two Bamba assists on his debut. We’re flying. The goal conceded? Bummer. Sergi gets a “welcome to MLS” moment (which turns to a “welcome to MLS” game) and gets bodied off the ball near his own 18 yard box, gifting the Crew a goal. Hey, ce la vie, the Fire are still flying and it’s FUN. 

Then Crew manager Wilfried Nancy does what he does. He makes a fantastic tactical adjustment, which Apple TV announcer Danny Higgenbotham does a great job of spotting immediately. Up until this point Bamba is just tearing into Crew CB Steven Moreira who sits on the left side of the Crew's back three. Nancy then makes a tactical tweak right after that champagne Fire passage of play that I described above. He tries something different (genius). He pushes Moreria into the attack and the CB has a direct role in the Crew’s tying goal in the 38’ (a Teran OG) and go ahead goal in the 45’.

I’m not sure how you feel about momentum graphs but I think they’re ✨fun✨ and here you can practically see exactly where Nancy makes this adjustment and how much it swung the game. 

(If you want to hear more about this in-depth, I encourage you to fire up the game on a rewatch and skip to this point, Higginbotham describes it perfectly) (Also this graph is from FotMob, the GOAT soccer app). 

From there, my analysis of the season opener falls into these quick hit half baked thoughts below:

• I truly think our guy Philly Zinkernagel will cook once the Fire are able to assert their dominance in possession, but until that time comes, he’s going to likely be quiet in transition/during live ball situations and also probably just generally sad :/

• Who let the Fire get Jonathan Bamba for 2 mill?? Dude he’s electric and he also gives the initial impression he’s only got more to give. LFG

• The Guti yellow card that then turned into a red was a big ole bummer, especially after those two goals. Would’ve loved to keep that momentum going.

• Guti missing out also really highlighted and drove home the Fire’s early season injury issues and their lack of midfield depth. Even if Sergi Oregal had a rooooough first start, he was still pretty much penciled in to start the next match following Guti’s suspension. Alex Calabrese mentions here in MIR97 that Sean Davis and Hasani Dotson could be good options and I’d like to second that! 

That of course leads us to the home opener against D.C. United the following week. Tim Hotze from MIR97 pointed out that it was the coldest home opener in Chicago Fire history and let me tell you, it sure felt like it. 

That’s right, I was there! Went to Reggies (Go Sox <3 ) with the boys beforehand, then took their complimentary bus to the stadium. I’ll tell you what, that is a formula for success once it warms up a bit. I look forward to our second false spring immensely. I’ll fall for it just as hard as the first. 

And man did I fall for that first feeling of Chicago warmth and wow did I crash back down to earth sitting in Soldier Field. No amount of Chicago handshakes (with Gregg) could have warmed my heart following the way THAT match ended. God himself decided to spite the Chicago Fire and probably me personally as well (probably because I went inside during halftime instead of staying out and witnessing the wonder of his creation). 

I don’t have a ton of in-depth analysis for this one and I can’t pretend I have a strong will to rewatch it, but I do have some things to say about what took place in South Loop last Saturday.

Some thoughts:

• Despite what I previously said about God spiting the Fire, the Boys in Red were lucky to leave with a point IMO. The two goals off set pieces for Cuypers were:

  • 1) So sweet to see (nearly 2xG & 2xGOT from the exact same spot. Those should always be goals but credit to Cuypers for being in position to score them. A good omen going forward.) &

  • 2) So poorly defended. D.C. looked the better team most of the match, our midfield really struggled, which compounded into not being able to possess the ball for extended periods of time.

• You know who looked awesome, freaking Chris Brady in goal. Long may that continue. 

• Gregg’s switch to a back 5 at the end of the match back(Fire)d and the team basically just tried to board up the door while United attacked relentlessly with little worry of being hurt in transition. Little did they know, they didn’t need a battering ram to break through Chicago, they just needed whatever crazy medieval weapon is equivalent to a sliced bicycle kick (maybe as simple as throwing a rock at a castle and causing it to crumble. Also anyone else playing Kingdom Come Deliverance 2?)  

• Sam Rogers spot start for Teran who left during warm ups didn’t inspire a ton of confidence but I’d also love to see him play with a more experienced midfield in front of him before any real judgement.

• Gutman was great going forward again. You could see the Crew and D.C. both tried to test balls over the top of him which he nullified pretty well for the most part. Something i just happened to notice and am curious to see if FC Dallas this Saturday attempts to do the same. 

What’s Next:

A trip to the Big D to take on Luciano Acosta and FC Dallas is on the docket for this weekend. I’ll be honest with you right now, I’m more than a little worried about how this will go. Acosta and Musa seem to have already found a groove and this will be a level of attack above the D.C. United team that already looked better than the Fire last weekend. 

BUT

Hope springs eternal. Have you checked the radar? It’s supposed to be 58 degrees and sunny in Chicago this weekend. Another weekend is just another new beginning for Gregg and co., and also for this podcast. As for this newsletter, this feels right and exactly how it’s supposed to start. If you’ve made it this far, thank you so much for reading. 

A good start really is half the battle. Berhalter’s vision is already beginning to shine through the melancholy cracks of Soldier Field, Bamba seems a steal, Guti looks poised to make a leap, and hell, there’s still time in the transfer window for more moves to be made. I’d say that’s enough evidence to be cautiously optimistic this positive trajectory may stick, and those intrusive “here we go again” thoughts of old prove false. Now it’s time to build upon that foundation.

Wishing you the warmth of a spring patio with friends and sweet thoughts of what took place at 30’ in Columbus. 

Sláinte! 🍻