Chicago Fire Interim Head Coach Brian Bliss
Opening statement…
It certainly was the furthest thing from what we expected in the way we trained during the week and the effort that was put into the training and the mentality during the week. Today’s performance could not have been further from it, and I think if we had gone into the half at 0-0, it would have been a different ball game, not that 4-0 is something to wipe away. It was a bit of a soft goal in terms of two plays from us that led to that goal. It was two of our touches that led to Pontius’ goal, not their touches. The game is what it is and it ended up 4-0 and we have to take responsibility for that.
On D.C. United’s performance...
Their block of eight is pretty robust, and they made it difficult for our guys to hold onto the ball when it came into Gilly, Harry and later on David Accam up front. We could never get any kind of possession going in the other end of the field. We had some possession, but it was more around midfield and the back part of our field. It’s very difficult to play against, and we lost a lot of second balls today and in general I would say the fight wasn’t there.
On Harry Shipp…
Obviously, everything is good for him and there’s stuff he can put in the bank, in terms of his learning process and playing in that area of the field. It’s not like he hasn’t played there before, he just hasn’t done it with us too often. I thought the first half he got on the ball and got us out of trouble a few times and it was one of the brighter spots in terms of him helping us keep it with the limited possession we did get in the first half. We kind of lost our way a little bit in the second half, and I brought David [Accam] up front a little bit and thought maybe his pace and speed is something we’d get in behind him on and put Harry in the midfield. Obviously, it didn’t work out.
On the positives to be taken from this match…
Not many. We had a couple of guys that I thought really got after it, played what I would say their capabilities are and we had probably most if not all, other than those two, who didn’t get out there and get after it and give a good performance. We can always say that if things are going well out there for you on the ball, everybody can fight and we did not bring that today.
On the team’s upcoming final game of the season…
It’s not going to be easy, obviously. If you come out of here with a better result then you can go home and go into that last game feeling better about yourself and you feel better about yourself getting a result. But we’ll look at some guys who probably haven’t had as many minutes as some other guys this year and try to maybe mix up the lineup a bit and give some of the other guys some opportunities to show what they can do. Hopefully, the playing ability, along with the mentality, will carry the day for us.
Chicago Fire Goalkeeper Jon Busch
Opening statement…
It just sums up our season right there. The first goal comes just off of a broken play again and one of our defenders toe pokes it on to Pontius and he is in and around. Again, it’s on us. Not to take anything away from them, because they are a very talented team, but the only good goal they got was off of the header on the corner. We battled hard the first half. We had some good chances, we didn’t take advantage of those and the second half just kind of fell apart. The third goal is deflected, he’s trying to cross the ball and it’s just a freak thing and it goes in. On the fourth, somebody takes a long shot, it gets deflected, pops up right to Saborío and he is just there to pop up on a rebound. In essence, in all honesty, that just sums up our season right there. We do some good things during games, especially in the first half, and then it just falls apart in the second half like that. It’s frustrating for the boys.
On moving on to the next game…
You have to. We’re at a point where nobody is safe. Nobody knows what is going to happen next year, and this is a gut check time, this is for boys to show if they want to be here next year for whoever the coach is. It’s frustrating, but this is the profession we live. This is what it’s about; it’s about winning games. The first half, we were decent. The second half, we weren’t good. We put ourselves in those positions, too, by being sloppy with the ball and things like that. We have to pick ourselves up and guys individually have to prove that they want to be here next year. I want to be here next year and other guys need to step up and take that same attitude because that wasn’t good enough in the second half tonight.
