After a much needed week off – their last until the end of the regular season – the Chicago Fire are back in action Saturday night. The game is at “home” but only in a loose, historical sense, as the Fire are set to return to SeatGeek Stadium for the first time in regular season play this year.

If the venue is a familiar one – at least to the fans, if not the many of the players, with half the squad having arrived this season after the team’s move to the new training ground – the opponent is not: The Fire are set to meet Los Angeles FC for the first time in a competitive match since 2019.

In the time since their last meeting, LAFC have won MLS Cup (with current Fire players Kellyn Acosta and Jack Elliott contributing half of the goals between the two teams in that 2022 final), the Fire have returned to Soldier Field as their (primary) home and virtually the entire rosters from both squads have turned over, with defender Eddie Segura of Los Angeles the lone holdover.

Moving to the present: Although the game does not have the same “must-win” air for either team that the Fire’s last match against the Red Bull did, it’s still a key matchup for both sides: The Fire, in the 9th and final postseason spot, are in control of their own destiny with 10 games remaining, but to stay there, will need to get results – particularly at home where most of the team’s remaining games will be played.

Los Angeles, meanwhile, are looking to climb the standings and secure homefield advantage for as long in the playoffs as they can manage it. The team has finished no lower than third in the past three seasons under Head Coach Steve Cherundolo, topping the conference twice but currently sits in sixth place. The team does have at least two games in hand over the field – but converting those games in hand to points will be a key challenge as the team looks to secure a trophy in Cherundolo’s final year with the club.

Series History

All time: 1W-1D-0LLast match: May 4, 2019: Los Angeles FC 0-0 Chicago Fire at BMO (then Banc of California) StadiumLast home match:September 29, 2018: Chicago Fire 3-1 Los Angeles FC at SeatGeek Stadium (then Toyota Park), Bridgeview, Ill.

What to Expect

Los Angeles FC

Since the Chicago Fire last played LAFC, the team has competed for nearly every trophy available to teams in MLS, winning MLS Cup (2022, with Fire midfielder Kellyn Acosta opening the scoring), the Supporters Shield twice (2020, 2023), the U.S. Open Cup (2024), and falling in the final of both the CONCACAF Champions League (now Cup, in 2023), and Leagues Cup (2023).

All of those trophies after the initial Supporters Shield in 2020 happened under Cherundolo, who took over from former Fire (and U.S. Men’s National Team) coach Bob Bradley after the 2001 season. Cherundolo, who played with the USMNT alongside Gregg Berhalter, including at the 2006 World Cup, has announced that this season will be his last in the dugout for Los Angeles.

That puts added pressure on the team – now out of every competition save Major League Soccer, having fallen in the Leagues Cup group stage  – to win hardware this year and cap off Rockford, Illinois native Cherundolo’s run with the club.

To that end, the team allowed the departure of Olivier Giroud over the summer, after the French World Cup winner’s style proved ineffective in LAFC’s counter-attacking system and announced the signing of superstar Son Heung-min in a league record-breaking incoming transfer with Tottenham earlier this week. Son isn’t expected to feature in this match, also out is former USMNT center-back Aaron Long, a key part of the team’s defense.

Since the Fire’s last home game, Los Angeles played three games in the Leagues Cup, including a heavily-rotated squad which beat Liga MX giant Tigres on Tuesday. The extra games and absences put an additional strain on LAFC, who typically play a fast, counter-attacking style against the ball.

Chicago Fire

While fatigue may be an issue for the visitors, the Chicago Fire, meanwhile, face a question of rust, with a gap of 14 days between their last game against the Red Bulls and this one.

Still – the Fire badly needed rest after a stretch through seven games in the span of a month, capped off with their 1-0 victory against New York. The week off was the Fire’s last of the regular season until the October international break, with the Fire playing nine of their remaining 10 matches before then. Physically, the group is as rested as they are going to get before the team’s postseason is secured – or not.

That isn’t weighing heavily on Berhalter’s mind, though. When asked about the team’s position in the standings, the Fire coach said, “You know, I'm not in the prediction business. I know that we're focused on this week, right, and this week only. I think as long as we do our job, hopefully we'll be there at the end. That's all we can control.”

So far, what the team has been able to control has been matches against mid-tier and lower opponents. Against some of the league’s best teams – Nashville, San Diego and Cincinnati – the team has often fallen short.

A win against LAFC, one of the top teams in the league in recent seasons, and whose underlying numbers put them as one of the top teams in the league – would go a ways to changing that narrative and showing that the team can not just compete but get results against the league’s elite (the team did get an away win to the Vancouver Whitecaps earlier this year when the team was atop the standings).

The game isn’t a measuring stick to Berhalter, however, who said “for us, we know we've made progress. That's the important thing. You know, the result of this game on the weekend won't validate that either way. We know we've grown as a group and team, and we want to keep improving. All this is another opportunity to keep improving. Good opponent; they have some big threats in their team; difficult to break down; very dangerous in the counterattack; have produced goals from high press. So a number of things that make them challenging. It's a fun challenge for our group, and we'll be ready for it.”

For the team to continue on the trajectory they’re on – one that ends in the postseason – they need to get results at home, where six of the team’s remaining 10 matches will be played. That includes SeatGeek, where the Fire will play for six league games, including this one.

Projected Starting XI

Match Information and How to Watch

Date and Time: Saturday, August 9, 2025, 7:30 PM CTForecast: Temperatures in upper 80s around kickoff, cooling to upper 70s laterLocation: SeatGeek Stadium, Bridgeview, Ill.TV: Apple TV – MLS Season PassRadio: WLS 890 AM and wlsam.com (English), Que Buena Fire via the Uforia App (Spanish).