Fire, Nashville SC Find Rough Going in 0-0 Draw

“Of course, on the other hand, you wish that you create more,” Wicky said.  You wish you could bury one of these little chances, but it was difficult for both teams.”

Frederico Navarro had a first-hand look and was a bit part of keeping Nashville SC away from the goal. Plus, there were some situations the Fire can be better at in the future.

“They’re a strong team, they defend really well, they defend do-or-die out there,” Navarro said “But I think that we also created a lot of situations out there, we just need to correct a few things and finish some of our chances. I think that they deserve the second place, it’s well done, they play very well, but we’re up to par with any team that’s out there. I think we just have to correct a few errors and keep going out there.”

Chicago (6-15-6, 24 points) was in search of three points to help its position in the table, while Nashville SC (11-3-12, 45 points) has a solid hold in second place behind New England (62 points) and leads the league with 12 draws this season.

Both teams also had to deal with a rugged field that was left from the day before since Wisconsin and Notre Dame had played football on the Soldier Field surface.

“This wasn’t a great game for us and the conditions weren’t great,” Nashville SC keeper Joe Willis said. “We didn’t play great, but we had a good opportunity to a point on the road.”

Nashville SC was making its first-ever appearance at Soldier Field but played without CJ Sapong and Hany Mukhtar.

“CJ was more of a case of giving him a flat-out rest,” Nashville SC coach Gary Smith said. “I think he needed it from carrying some lumps and bumps. Hany was in good enough condition to be apart of this. Had the field been in better shape, I might have risked him. But I just wasn’t prepared to put him into that situation, knowing that the qualities he has we’re really not going to be seen on that field.”

Fire head coach Wicky was also celebrating the 40-year anniversary championship for the Chicago Sting from the original North American Soccer League by wearing a Sting t-shirt.

“Well it’s obviously supporting the history, supporting the history of a great team who a lot of years ago, 40 years ago today, achieved something big and that’s great. I saw as well a lot of these players from that time were here and came and still are connected to Chicago and that’s obviously great.”

Even the former coach was still amazed to see how may fans that remember the day and the championship that was achieved in Toronto in 1981.

“The amazing part is that people still remember us,” The former Sting head coach Willy Roy said. “We’re talking about almost a half-century. It’s exciting of course to see all the players, close family friends. It’s my own personal family and people I’ve seen that were loyal Sting fans. They would travel any place to meet the players again.”

The past of soccer has come a long way from the old NASL days and there’s some comparisons from then to know.

“I do want soccer to succeed, in the 80s we had some of the best players in the world, but we didn’t have any stadiums,” Roy said. “We had played at Wrigley Field or Comiskey Park, which wasn’t bad. But if you had to play in a venue at Soldier Field that held 77,000. Unless, you had 50,000 it was hard to sell an event to come too. We laid the groundwork with the Chicago Sting. New York Cosmos and the Tampa Bay Rowdies. I know soccer will succeed. I do wish the Fire good luck.”

The Chicago Fire will next play Wednesday hosting New York City FC at 7 p.m. CT, while Nashville SC hosts Orlando at 7:30 CT.