from the Chi Fire website:

The Chicago Fire (4-7-15, 27 points) shift their focus to a Lamar Hunt U.S. Open Cup Semifinal against the Richmond Kickers at TOYOTA PARK on Tuesday, Aug. 30 at 7:30 p.m. CT with the match streaming live on Chicago-Fire.com. The Fire have never lost a home U.S. Open Cup match after the tournament’s round of 16, holding a perfect 11-0-0 record, outscoring opponents 30-10, in quarterfinals, semifinals and finals played in Chicagoland.

Me: Everything reverts to the mean in the fullness of time.

I will say this- The Fire are beatable. The question is what mentality our team has? Was the disaster the other night a result of looking ahead or not being focused on the game? Or(I really hope it's not this one) are the Kickers just falling here at the end? Either way this is the season. Win or go home. Losing the other night basically means all our chips are in one basket. If the Kickers can bring the US Open Cup back to Richmond the USL playoffs crash will become basically forgotten.

Just win. Don't care how ugly it is, or what it takes, get it done.



Although a blowout win would be nicer for the nerves.

Go kickers.
As you all know by now, USOC victories taste soooo sweet.
We, Minnesota Fans, know this, for our Thunder had an epic run in the USOC in 2005. Winning against MLS teams: Real Salt Lake; Colorado Rapids (claiming the 2005 Rocky Mountain Cup); Kansas City Wizards (2004 USOC Champs). We made it to the Semi-Finals in LA vs the Gals.

Kick 'em

Go get 'em knickers ! The whole of the soccer Commonwealth are behind you !

Gus' Bar and Girl is gonna be full tonight.

U guys have any sound on the pregame, or are they just filling time?

I have no sound and shooty video at the moment.

Thanks. I'm not going deaf!

did you just lose the video feed?

*shoddy

Damn.
Good goal.
Wrong team....

Missed seeing that one.
Got one back!

Well that's that !

Great effort by the team. Good season this year. Add a few pieces to the puzzle and let's go get em next season.

As much I despise Seattle I'll be rooting for them. Chicago fans annoyed me with constant complaints of how refs favored us. Fire escaped because of a PK. If the ref was favoring he had two chances to call PKs for the Kickers. They can whine all they want but the ref was definitely not being partial to us. Every flop the Fire pulled they got the call. To Fire fans the fact that their players dropped every seconds must mean we're roughing them up. Or maybe it just means the team hits the ground more than Cristiano Ronaldo.

Great effort by the Kickers. They had too many things going against them tonight. Can't wait until next season.

Rooting for Seattle in the final is just encouraging the status quo of the bid system. As annoying as Oduro and Nyarko were with their incessant "injuries", the Fire is still a much more tolerable option.

Pretty decent turnout of Richmond fans there tonight actually. I'm about 95% sure I saw Paul Lekics in the crowd, and there were some other transplanted Richmonders there to support the team in addition to the various players families. Tough break for Hertel to give up the penalty especially since it sounded like he had a ton of friends there. He did really well the rest of the game to control the Chicago speed up front.

Still not sure how Johnson didn't get at least a yellow on the handball incident. Other than that and the time wasting there wasn't much else that I really had an issue with in terms of the refereeing. Better team just won unfortunately.

They must have had fun playing against Chicago with 8,900 fans watching. One of their biggest US Open Cup games.

Good job to get all the way to the semis Richmond!

nothing to hang our heads about, in the result or the performance. We just didnt get the breaks and Chicago did. no shame in that loss. Congrats to the Fire and good luck. I really mean that. I respect the Fire for taking us seriously and respecting us, if that makes any sense.

Solid effort, guys. Your team is to be commended for reaching the semi's.

Congratulations to the Kickers. Nice run in the 2011 USOC.

The USOC was something that I really missed this season as our NASL teams were banned.

See ya'll next year for some of the best mid-week fixtures of the season.

Peace and futbol.

LS - NASL teams banned?...I saw in another post JW7 stated that this was not the case. So what gives, did you guys get banned or not? If so, that's garbage...you guys would have added a lot of good competition, color and passion.

Either way, you guys need to be in it next year so we can have 2 MLS, 1 NASL and 1 USL team in the USOC semi's!

Well done...watched the whole thing on-line but somehow missed your goal, I must have blinked at the wrong time.

Pretty even game, they were just a little more consistent in their attack & a little more composed on the ball. But that's to be expected between our level and MLS. You seemed to do well on the right wing, just not enough of it.

Looking forward to next season and if anyone is in the Chucktown area on Oct 2, Blackbaud will be hosting its annual Oktoberfest festival, always a good time and the weather is perfect.

Come on you Fire!

I agree Mike. Chicago took the game with us and the entire USOC seriously and I have to give kudos to them for that.
JBG I too missed the goal. I was doing something here and looked up and they said it was a goal.
Fair assessment by everyone on the game. Mike didn't one of the Kickers former GMs (Paul Sterbenz) move to that area when he left the Kickers ?

IF we are Div 3, who is Div 2?