The Chicago Fire’s winning streak is over but the undefeated streak continues as a heavily rotated squad managed to get a draw at Sports Illustrated Stadium. At the end of the day, that’s a respectable result considering the team’s focus is squarely on Tuesday’s Leagues Cup matchup.
What is concerning, however, is that the New York Red Bulls were able to exploit a lot of the Fire’s weaknesses in a way we haven’t seen in recent matches.
Is that nothing more than the fact that the rotated lineup performed well, but not as well as it could have? Or did Michael Bradley start writing a textbook for the Fire’s future opponents to follow?
Here’s what we learned last night in Harrison.
All good things come to an end
The Fire’s winning streak was going to end. The fact that it did in this game is, in some ways, unsurprising: Depending on how you count, seven of the Fire’s 11 starters in that game are either not part of the best XI, or were playing out of their usual spot, if you count Maren Haile-Selassie starting in a deeper midfield position and Joel Waterman taking the left center back spot
The Fire were, throughout the course of the 90 minutes, the better team. The Red Bulls were more clinical with the opportunities they had. Neither team, though, really put out an effort that suggested they should have had more than a single goal.
After the win in Orlando, we talked about how the margins are tight. That was on display here.
A few changes to the Fire’s execution, and they likely could have exploited the weaknesses on the Red Bulls squad, but that wasn’t the game that happened.
The Red Bulls figured out the Fire’s weaknesses
The Fire’s strategy for about the first 25 minutes in this one was to try to build up centrally, getting the midfield to advance the ball before distributing it forward to attack. Think something along the lines of, Brady passes it to Sam Rogers on his right, who sends it to Joel Waterman on the left then back, trying to pull the Red Bulls onwards and create space elsewhere. Then onwards to Mauricio Pineda, through to Maren Haile-Selassie, then to Jonathan Bamba or Robin Lod.
Because of the Red Bull’s press – and, frankly, personnel – it didn’t work, and they were able to impose control on the central areas. The Fire’s midfield actually did a good job keeping the Red Bulls from getting turnovers in dangerous areas and creating something going the other way, but they also didn’t do much to create.
Some of it’s probably down to who was available in this one: None of the Fire’s midfielders normally are usual starters in their positions. Sergio Oregel Jr., the rotation piece closest to doing what the Fire needed, wasn’t available due to injury.
These were Sam Williams first (and possibly only) competitive minutes with the first team this year, Pineda has played just over 600 minutes in 2026. Haile-Selassie, the Fire’s only goalscorer, actually has the fifth most minutes on the team, and isn’t far behind the leaders amongst outfield players, but those have largely been in a more advanced spot on the wing.
But even with the Fire’s usual starters in the midfield, say, if it had been Anton Salétros and Djé D’Avilla with Maren Haile-Selassie, I’m not at all sure that the Red Bulls wouldn’t have been able to frustrate the Fire nearly as much as they were able to.
To the Fire’s credit, they adapted from about the 25th minute onwards: In build up, Pineda moved wide and was more advanced, and the Fire got on the board late in the second half.
The problems recurred in the second half: Playing down a goal, the Red Bulls were leaving more space between their lines but were still able to channel the Fire centrally, where they were prepared to frustrate the visitors.
… and as a result, the Fire’s best players weren’t as involved
That frustration came out largely in the form of keeping the Fire’s best players from being as involved as they could have.
Philip Zinckernagel played the first 65 minutes of this one and had just one shot – a header from about eight yards out that sailed far wide of the net. Only one of his five crosses – itself not a massive number – was able to connect.
The issue wasn’t really a poor effort from Zinckernagel, it was that the Fire weren’t able to build up as successfully through the right as they were the left, and with how the Fire’s attacking sequences were shaking out, when the ball did make it to the left, Zinckernagel wasn’t a target for a switch: Even with time and space, he was isolated too often: There, but not dangerous.
With André Franco still not back from injury (and, let’s be honest, unlikely to be playing at his best in 2026 regardless), the lack of a creative midfielder who can play through pressure and unlock defenses is a key need with the window open.
It looks like Leon Goretzka, the Fire’s most publicized target in the area, is off the board. If true, you can’t convince me that the Fire probably didn’t dodge a bullet there, but regardless, it’s a key need for reinforcement and one the team is working on, with Anzor Mekvabishvili the most recent rumor.
Unlike Goretzka, he may not be a Designated Player (though depending on contract details, the Fire might put him on that tag for the rest of the year for cap reasons), providing the Fire with more roster flexibility, though that likely means for 2027 rather than in this window.
(and that includes Lewandowski)
From kickoff, it was clear that thousands came to Harrison last night to see exactly one player (more on this in a sec). In the 65th minute, they got what they came for, as Robert Lewandowski came on for Zinckernagel.
On the broadcast, Stege Cangialosi noted that the crowd’s reaction to seeing Poland’s best player of all time standing on the sidelines, waiting to come on, was similar to the reaction to seeing Lionel Messi about to come on for the first time at at then-Red Bull Arena a couple of years ago.
They got to see their hero, but ultimately, they didn’t get to see him do too much: In just under a half an hour including stoppage time, Lewandowski had 11 touches, none in the box.
On Wednesday against Orlando, Lewandowski did draw a penalty and score, but outside of that? He had just two shots on target. One, from near the edge of the box, that was blocked, and a header from much closer in during the game’s opening minutes that went wide.
If you said that you were surprised that that early shot went wide, you wouldn’t be alone – I’ve got the text messages from enough people to prove it – but honestly, every player is going to miss and some of those will be wide off the mark, even elite ones and you don’t normally think about it.
You do, however, think about it a lot more if that ends up being a big part of the player’s highlight reel for the day, and that’s been the issue with Lewy for too much of his first nine games with the Fire.
While he’s certainly been less than perfect with the involvement that he had, I don’t think that’s really been the problem. Instead, it’s that he hasn’t been involved enough.
Will Mekvabishvili be the answer Lewandowski needs? I’m not sure, but something needs to change, whether through internal shifts or, more likely, reinforcement.
Still, Lewy can move tickets (at least in some markets)
Since joining the Fire, Robert Lewandowski has actually played as many league games in the New York metropolitan area as he has in Chicago.
Ahead of the Fire’s game against New York City FC at Yankee Stadium, I was struck by the number of Lewandowski jerseys that were, well, everywhere. From the minute I got off the subway to time walking the concourse, there were nearly as many Poland shirts as there were for the home team.
The 27,419 in attendance for that game made it the second biggest crowd that NYCFC has had at home, behind only their meeting against Inter Miami back in March.
I wasn’t in Harrison for this one, but Alex Calabrese was, and he told me it felt like there were more Poland kits than there were Red Bulls ones in and around Sports Illustrated Stadium last night.
As a result, the Red Bulls reported just their second sellout of the year (the first was the derby match against NYCFC in May). That may not pass the eye test, but that’s not the point: The Red Bulls likely sold every seat in the house.
The thousands of empty seats that were visible to anyone with eyes attached to their head? My bet is that it’s season ticket holders who put their seats up for resale and made other plans.
For the second time this year, Lewandowski sold a lot of tickets in New York, just as he has in Chicago, where attendance for the Fire’s only two home games at Soldier Field since Lewy joined was north of 30,000.
Since returning to Soldier Field for the 2020 season, the only other times the Fire’s attendance has hit that level have been games against Inter Miami along with a 2022 game featuring Chicharito when he was with the LA Galaxy (attendance: 30,282), and the Fire’s final home game of the 2021 season against Real Salt Lake (31,308). That last match, served as their belated “welcome home” party, with the team pulling out all the stops – including giving season ticket holders additional free tickets – to hit that number.
It doesn’t happen everywhere, but in the right markets? Robert Lewandowski can sell a lot of seats, and now we’ve got enough data to talk about it. The effect may not be as widespread as what say, Chicharito was able to do, but in markets where it works? It’s an effect on a similar magnitude.
