Less than 72 hours after the final whistle blew in the Chicago Fire's 2-0 victory over Necaxa, they're back in action at Soldier Field as they take on Santos Laguna in the second of their three group stage matches.
Although the teams are coming into the second game of the tournament with somewhat different stakes, the Fire having won their opening match and Santos Laguna having dropped theirs, the Swiss format of the tournament and results around them somewhat even the stakes: When the teams woke up Saturday morning, only two of the five teams in Liga MX had gotten results (either a win or loss in PKs) in both of the matches they had played.
Both should feel like they absolutely need to win this one if they want to have a chance in advancing.
Will Santos Laguna feel like advancing is a possibility? Last year, two teams, both from Liga MX, did advance with six points, although on the MLS side of the bracket, teams needed at least 7 ‒ and help from goal differential – to make it through.
On the most recent episode of The Bonfire, we pondered how dedicated to winning this game Santos Laguna would be, now that they've dropped their first match of the group phase, having also lost their first three matches of the Apertura in Liga MX: Will they effectively call it quits on the tournament, rolling out a B team and turning their focus to being ready for their next league match?
Or will Renato Paiva, staring down the barrel at the possibility of losing his first five matches in charge – and with three tough opponents on the horizon in Liga MX – go all in for a win, because this is a squad that needs points on the board?
For the second time this tournament, between seeding, home-field advantage, and performance so far, the Fire are favorites in this one.
Against Necaxa, they emerged victorious.
In this one? Last summer, here's what Paiva said while coaching Botafogo ahead of that team's match against Paris Saint-Germain in the Club World Cup: "The cemetery of football is full of favorites."
His squad went on to defeat their heavily-favored opponents.
Is that a fair way to frame this one? Gregg Berhalter doesn't think so. After putting that front to the Fire head coach on Saturday, here's what he said: "For us, you can analyze it any way you want and make any inferences about what this game means, but we know what it means. We know what this is about. We know we need to win the game. We know they need to win the game and I think that's enough.”
Santos Laguna
If Paiva's name seems familiar, it may be from making headlines after that victory last summer, or it might be because the last time the Fire played in this tournament, in 2024, he was coaching Toluca.
He left Toluca a few months thereafter: Although Toluca finished second in the league table in the 2024 Apertura, during the playoffs, the team had a quick exit in the quarterfinals by a 4-0 aggregate, a disappointing result for a team that had ambitions of winning the whole thing. The decision was described as mutual ‒ but it felt more like he was being shown the door than being given a friendly handshake.
Three months later, he joined Botafogo. Just fifteen days after that upset over PSG in the Club World Cup, he was dismissed after his squad lost 1-0 to fellow Brazilian side Palmeiras in a game that needed extra time to be decided. After a brief spell at Fortaleza, with one win in 10 games, he was again shown the door.
The expectations at Santos Laguna, who finished bottom of the table in last year's Clausura, may be more modest, but the team is now winless in their first four matches under Paiva at the helm.
Despite that, he remains a highly-regarded manager with strong ideas about positional play coming from his 15 years at various levels of Benfica's youth ranks. Those ideas could, at least on paper, help elevate his new squad.
Here's what Gregg Berhalter had to say about how the opponent plays: "We've seen them pressing in a 4-4-2, attacking in a 4-2-3-1. So they have players between the lines, they have their fullbacks mid-height to get numbers forward."
On top of squad form, Santos Laguna also face additional headwinds, with Paiva saying that the trip from New York "that should have taken 2 hours took 5 or 6," saying that his team had the fatigue of that weather-related ordeal.
That meant, Paiva said, that the training the team was able to do today was "more for the players to loosen up, because I'm telling you, yesterday was very heavy." There is also the short turnaround between matches, with Paiva saying that the although his team "studied [the Fire's system] obviously as much as possible, with the time we have, we prepared for it, uh, more in theory than in practice."
Chicago Fire
The Fire didn't have travel to contend with, and they're also getting Joel Waterman back after he was suspended in the last game, but it's still short rest.
After the Fire's win on Thursday, he said the focus would be on "a lot of video work. A lot of recovery modalities. A lot of massage. And, let them be on their own for a little bit also. Nutrition's important, sleep's important," while noting that the conditions are the same for Santos.
The Fire's win over Necaxa on Thursday was the first time in recent games that the Fire relied on a three man midfield, although we did see Robin Lod playing more as a midfielder in parts of the team's win against Charlotte the Saturday before.
Will we see it again? "I guess it just depends on the team and the formations of the teams that we play. We figured this would be man-to-man. So we figured this would give them a little bit of trouble," Jonathan Dean said on Thursday after scoring the opening goal against Necaxa.
That echoes what Berhalter said after the game, saying the 4-3-3 was "another look a different look, and we liked it. But it doesn't mean we're going to continue with it."
Read that how you will — Berhalter was not going to telegraph his plans for the next match to the media that night – but it got strong performances out of every position group.
