BRIDGEVIEW, IL—The Chicago Fire had been lacking a central attacking midfielder. On Thursday, the Fire look to have achieved their target in signing Argentine attacking midfielder Nicolas Gaitan on a free transfer from Chinese Super League side Dalian Yifang.
Gaitan, 31, was signed with Discretionary Targeted Allocation Money (DTAM, Targeted Allocation Money (TAM), plus sending $50,000 in General Allocation Money (GAM) to Seattle Sounders FC for discovery rights. Gaitan will be added to the Fire roster pending receipt of his P-1 Visa and ITC. He is under contract for 2019 with a club option for 2020.
“We have wanted to add another attacking piece and believe Nico’s dynamism and play-making ability could be a perfect fit,” said Fire President and General Manager Nelson Rodrίguez.
Gaitan has a total of 274 league appearances and 42 goals in the top divisions in Argentina, Portugal, Spain and China. His club list includes Boca Juniors (2008-2010), Benfica (2010-2016), and Atletico Madrid (2016-2018). It was at Benfica where he had his greatest success where he made 68 appearances in the UEFA Champions League and helped the Portuguese club to three Portuguese Primera Liga titles, five Portuguese League Cups, and one Taca de Portugal trophy.
Gaitain has earned 19 caps for Argentina, including five in 2018 FIFA World Cup Qualifying and three caps in the 2016 Copa America Centenario.
THOUGHTS: The addition of Gaitan is to address the need of a central attacking midfielder. You now have the wing midfielders in Aleksandar Katai and Przemyslaw Frankowski and the defensive midfielders in Dax McCarty and Bastian Schweinsteiger. The question now is where does leave Djordje Mihailovic? Whatever way you look at it, it does add more depth to the midfield and addressed a need that has been lacking at least since Cuauhtemoc Blanco was on the Fire.
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