The game in 100 words (or less more): I watched this one so you didn’t have to! That’s the kind of service we provide here at PST, and you’re welcome. Another potential service we can offer: figuring out what in the world the Chicago Fire are doing. For starters, all of 10,000 people showed up to Toyota Park to watching the Men in Red play to a 0-0 draw with Columbus Crew SC on Saturday, as both sides picked up their first point of 2016. Moreover, they’re quite possibly the most inept attacking team MLS has ever known (through just three games, admittedly). First-year head coach Veljko Paunovic seems an awfully smart guy, and he’s got some evolutionary ideas that make you think there might be hope in Bridgeview, but it’s extremely bleak right now. Four shots (one on goal) is all they could muster in this one, at which point you’re reminded they traded Harry Shipp, far and away their best chance creator in his first two seasons as a professional. Meanwhile, the Montreal Impact, Shipp’s new team, has scored six goals in two games while putting 11 of 25 shots on target (only partially through Shipp’s doing/involvement, admittedly). The optics of trading Shipp, the Fire’s homegrown hero, were bad enough when the deal was done last month, but three games into the 2016 season, a player like Shipp is exactly what the Fire are missing, and it, somehow, looks worse now than it did then. It’s so ludicrous that even current Impact players can’t quite believe their luck.
@MLSAnalyst they gave us their creator. Lol
— Patrice Bernier (@pbernier10) March 19, 2016
[ MORE: Previewing the rest of MLS Week 3 ]
Three moments that mattered
58' — Meira heads the ball off his own crossbar — Joao Meira so nearly scored the most embarrassing own goal MLS has seen since Matt Hedges’ wonderful finish one week ago, but the Portuguese was spared the embarrassment of heading the ball over his own goalkeeper, into his own net, thanks to the crossbar.
69' — Lampson soars across goal to deny Finlay — Ethan Finlay let one rip from every bit of 25 yards out, only to see his former teammate Matt Lampson fly across the face of goal to tip it wide in the game’s only moment of real intrigue.
.@EthanFinlay13 got all of it. @LampStrong was ready. #CHIvCLB https://t.co/UlbOFZQW6N
— Major League Soccer (@MLS) March 19, 2016
82' — Ramos goes down in the box, no penalty given — Rodrigo Ramos was hip-checked to the ground by Cedrick Mabwati inside the final 10 minutes of regular time, but referee Robert Sibiga wasn’t interested in awarding a game-changing penalty so late on with the decision 50-50 at best.
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Man of the match: Matt Polster
Goalscorers: LOL
