Preview: Chicago Fire vs. New England Revolution- prediction, team news, lineups
The Chicago Fire begins the 2021 MLS regular season on Saturday when they host the New England Revolution from Soldier Field.
The Fire had a strong pre-season with four wins while the Revolution picked up just one win in a shortened pre-season for them.
Match Preview:
Chicago has had their struggles in the league over the past few seasons having missed the playoffs in three consecutive seasons though they were only one point away from qualifying for the postseason in 2020.
Swiss manager Raphael Wicky is heading into his second season with a team relatively unchanged from 2020 as he hopes his ideas will be well engrained in the heads of his players.
One area the Fire will want to improve on this season is consistency which is where they struggled in 2020 going winless in their final 10 regular season games including three losses in the MLS is Back Tournament.
The Fire were at their best at home in 2020 winning their only five games of the regular season at Soldier Field and outscoring their opponents 13-2 in those matches.
Fresh off a season that saw them reach the Eastern Conference Finals, the Revolution are hungry to do even better in 2021.
Under Bruce Arena New England took another step forward last season with their best-ever finish to an MLS campaign.
The Revolution have never won the MLS Cup but given the depth and experience heading into this season there is hope they can bring home to title to Greater Boston.
In 2020 they were quite comfortable on the road winning six regular season games away from Foxborough while losing only three.
New England are unbeaten in their last three regular season matches versus the Fire.
Chicago Fire MLS Form:
W W L D W W (might have to change)
New England Revolution MLS Form:
L W D
© Reuters
Team News
Bulgarian winger Stanislav Ivanov will miss the first half of the season for Chicago after undergoing knee surgery which means they may have to rely on midfielder Alvaro Medran as the sole provider early on.
The departure of Djordje Mihailovic and CJ Sapong will put added pressure on Robert Beric to repeat his strong performance in 2020 scoring 12 goals for the Fire.
New England added some solid depth players to an already strong team.
Wilfrid Kaptoum should fill a void in central midfield while left-back Christian Mafla brings plenty of experience at the back having made over 190 appearances over the past 10 seasons in Colombia.
The Revs will depend on Carles Gil to create chances having led the team in assists over the past two seasons, while Teal Bunbury led the team in scoring with eight goals last season and will hope to get into double figures for only the second time in his MLS career.
Chicago Fire possible starting lineup:
Turner; Kessler, Farrell, Mafla, Bye; Kaptoum, Polster, Traustason, Bou, Gil; Buksa
New England Revolution possible starting lineup:
Turner; Kessler, Farrell, Mafla, Bye; Kaptoum, Polster, Traustason, Bou, Gil; Buksa
We say Chicago Fire 0-2 New England Revolution
The Fire are notoriously slow starters having not won a regular season opener since 2009 and following last season they will want to salvage as many points as possible.
New England thrived on the road last season and with some strong balance at every position and an experienced coach who knows what it takes to win they will be eager to fly out of the gates on Saturday.
Data Analysis
Our analysis of all available data, including recent performances and player stats up until an hour before kickoff, suggested the most likely outcome of this match was a Dallas win with a probability of 47.9%. A win for Colorado Rapids had a probability of 27.79% and a draw had a probability of 24.3%.
The most likely scoreline for a Dallas win was 1-0 with a probability of 9.53%. The next most likely scorelines for that outcome were 2-1 (9.45%) and 2-0 (7.87%). The likeliest Colorado Rapids win was 0-1 (6.93%), while for a drawn scoreline it was 1-1 (11.44%). The actual scoreline of 0-0 was predicted with a 5.8% likelihood.
