Victory before record crowd the pinnacle of Wyatt Omsberg’s career

Wyatt Omsberg’s four years in Chicago have been something of a rollercoaster.

An often-forgotten piece of depth in his first two seasons in 2020 and 2021, things took off for the Maine native when he had a dream start to the 2022 season. Omsberg played every minute at right center back for the first 13 games of the year and was earning All-Star shouts before a nasty injury on June 18th ended his season prematurely.

Fast forward to 16 months later, and Omsberg just did something that would have seemed crazy not too long ago: he played in integral part in a 4-1 Chicago Fire win over Inter Miami in front of more than 62,000 fans at Soldier Field.

“It ranks right at the top,” Omsberg said after the game on Wednesday. “Walking out for warmups we all knew it was going to be a really special night for us. Our fans are always awesome, but tonight especially 60,000 fans was a really unique experience for us.”

Incredibly, it was only less than two months ago that Omsberg started at center back against Inter Miami, but it wasn’t in MLS. It was against Miami’s reserve team in MLS Next Pro, where he was becoming a regular over the summer for Chicago Fire II. As he was without a first-team start in months, breaking back into the starting eleven by the end of the season seemed like a pipe dream.

Yet, here we are. Omsberg started and played the full 90 minutes in arguably the biggest game of recent history for the Fire, putting in a flawless performance at center back as his team obliterated Tata Martino’s new-look Miami squad. Even so, while the prospect of taking on Miami was still enticing, it changed somewhat when it became clear that Lionel Messi would not be playing.

“(Emotions were) a little bit mixed,” Omsberg said. “On the one hand it would be amazing to play against him, but on the other hand, they’re a little bit of a less dangerous team with the best player in the world not on the field…”

Even without Messi, Miami are still a strong team. A front three of Josef Martínez, Facundo Farías, and Robert Taylor is a very strong one, and with Sergio Busquets progressing the ball from the midfield, they still had plenty of chances. Omsberg, together with Rafa Czichos, Jonathan Dean, and Miguel Ángel Navarro along the back line, ensured that Chris Brady was barely tested. Some big defensive headers from Omsberg prevented the ball from getting in behind, as well as a moment when he broke up a through ball from Benjamín Cremaschi to Martínez in the first half.

The Fire’s stellar play on the field was fuelled in large part by the energy of the stadium, but coming into the game, there was something different about it. Not just the sheer number of fans who would be in attendance, which nearly tripled any other Fire games this season, but the color of shirts they’d be wearing. Messi fans made up a considerable chunk of the crowd, even when it was apparent he wouldn’t be there.

“We knew the kind of pressure that would be on us,” Omsberg said. “There’s a lot of fans here that we wanted to win over tonight and we wanted to do that with a complete performance and leave it all out there and make the city proud.”

“Too many pink jerseys,” Omsberg’s center back partner, Rafa Czichos, said. “When you live in Chicago or in the Chicago area, and you are interested in soccer then you should support your home club. I don’t think that all of the people wearing pink were from Miami today so I hope that they’ll be there on Saturday and next season with a different color.”

It’s safe to say that while most were disappointed that they didn’t get to see Messi, many were won over and the Fire earned a lot of new fans on Wednesday. As if the $250 credit for one-time buyers wasn’t enough to entice them to come back, the play on the field was lights out, and by the end of the 4-1 demolition, nearly all of the 62,124 fans at Soldier Field were celebrating. There’s no better time to get that momentum going, as the Fire have an opportunity to potentially clinch a postseason berth this weekend against Charlotte.

“Whether you’re our fans or whether you’re a Messi fan coming to watch Miami play whatever it is, we wanted to leave a good mark on this game,” Omsberg said. “I feel like we put in a complete performance.”

“Hopefully, come Saturday, we can get a lot of fans to pack the place and give us energy because it’ll be another huge game.”