Having secured a playoff berth for the first time since 2017, the Chicago Fire return home for their last home game of the regular season, now knowing that they will play on after Decision Day.

The Fire’s historic season continues in their second game of the year against Toronto FC, a team that will once again miss the playoffs.

Toronto has, in some ways, been a mirror image of the Fire: Joining the league in 2007, the team failed to make the playoffs in their first eight seasons, creating a record drought that stands to this day, which the Fire were in danger of tying had they not ended the streak this season. Now it’s Toronto which has once again found itself in hard times.

With playoffs the stated goal of the squad from the beginning of the season, is Gregg Berhalter worried about complacency setting now that they’ve secured that level?

“I think there's a natural tendency when you reach a milestone or reach an objective is to breathe out a little bit and relax a little bit, but you know, this time of year you can't do that because it really is about building momentum as you go into the playoffs,” the Fire head coach said, noting that he’s been “preaching all year long” that the Fire focus the next game. “We have an opponent in front of us. The only opponent we're looking at is Toronto right now, and we're focused on how to prepare for that game. So I think when you work with a process, when you are very consistent, the guys get used to that.”

Defender Jonathan Dean, having a career year for the Fire, believes the group’s aim is still to climb higher. “After the game [against Miami] and seeing the standings, there's room for us to actually keep climbing, right? So our goal now and our objective is to hopefully get out of the play-in game, which would be huge for us as well,” the Fire defender told reporters on Thursday. “The first thing was to make playoffs this year. Fortunately, we achieved that, but now as this group, we believe in ourselves that we can even go even farther than that.”

The game is also Fire homegrown Djordje Mihailović’s homecoming: It’s first match against his former team since returning to MLS after being traded to Montréal and then being sold on to Europe before returning to MLS last year.

Series History

All time: 13W-13D-14LLast match: March 15, 2025 Toronto 1-2 Chicago Fire FC, BMO Field, Toronto, Ont.Last home match: September 28, 2024: Chicago Fire 1-1 Toronto at SeatGeek Stadium, Bridgeview, Ill.

What to Expect

Toronto FC

While many Fire fans were disappointed with the production the team got from Xherdan Shaqiri when he was with the team and one of the league’s most expensive players, he was a comparative hit for the team compared to what Toronto got from their duo of Italian Designated Players.

Lorenzo Insigne was making nearly double Shaqiri’s salary and was actually less productive. Federico Bernardeschi was somewhat more effective on the pitch than his compatriot, but reportedly even worse in the locker room. Both were under contract through at least the middle of the 2026 season.

In the summer window, Toronto spent some of the smartest money we’ve seen from the club in years and issued buyouts to the two players at an eye-watering cost in what could possibly be the best example of addition by subtraction in league history.

Not that the Reds (not to be confused with the Men In Red, who predate them by a decade) only subtracted. After clearing DP spots by moving Insigne and Bernadeshi on, their big splash summer signing was Djordje Mihailović, on an $8 million cash transfer from the Colorado Rapids.

Mihailović was a standout of the Fire’s academy last decade, joining the first team for the 2017 season that saw the team reach the playoffs after a then-club-record drought of four seasons. The Fire, under Georg Heitz, traded him to CF Montréal ahead of the 2021 season.

In the seven games since Mihailović’s arrival, the results in Toronto have been an optimism Rorschach test: The team is undefeated, with one clean sheet and never conceded more than a single goal in a match. The team is also winless, having scored just six goals in the seven-game span, with six 1-1 draws interrupted only by a 0-0 scoreline.

Still, Head Coach Robin Fraser clearly has belief from within his locker room– not always a given for teams in that situation.  Here’s what the Fire’s gaffer said about their opponent: “They've been doing a great job lately,” noting the team’s seven draws “Djordje has given them a boost offensively, and they have quality players. They have a quality group. So for us we're not taking anything for granted.”

As Jonathan Dean noted, players on Toronto’s roster still have a lot to fight for, saying “you're going to have people out there still fighting for their jobs and trying to perform to showcase their abilities.”

Chicago Fire

The Chicago Fire have won four of their past five games, with three of the wins coming against opponents that will be in the playoffs and the fourth more or less knocking the New England Revolution out of contention. André Franco has started the past five games, and will now be out for, certainly, the rest of the season.

Is that a coincidence? Franco’s arrival, showing he can master the No. 10 central attacking midfielder role that remains crucial to many MLS squads also coincided with a shift to the Fire playing three center backs – a move also brought on by the arrival of Joel Waterman, a top-quality MLS center back who joined the Fire from Montréal.

That, in turn, allowed Sam Rogers to play out of a back three, which put the Seattle Sounders academy product in his best light, even as he’s overachieved any reasonable expectations for his first year in the league.

This becomes a chicken-and-egg problem: Waterman’s first start was against NYCFC on September 13th, the last time the Fire played with two center backs at kickoff. That game was also Franco’s second start.

Which is more responsible for the Fire’s stretch of three wins against competitive MLS sides? The play of Franco, or the arrival of Waterman and the switch to three center backs?

Berhalter may have tipped his hand: With Rogers suspended against Inter Miami, he stuck with a back three, playing Andrew Gutman out of position as a central defender. The Fire won that game.

Does that mean that, against Toronto, whose offense has been challenged all year, that that’s what we’re sure to see again? No, but it makes you think, doesn’t it?

Projected Starting XI

Match Information and How to Watch

Date and Time: Saturday, October 4, 2025, 7:30 PM CTForecast: Temperatures around 80’F at kickoff with clear skiesLocation: Soldier Field, Chicago, Ill.TV: Apple TV – MLS Season PassRadio: wlsam.com (English), Que Buena Fire via the Uforia App (Spanish).