Chicago Fire striker Andy Herron scored two goals on Saturday afternoon. But it was the one that got away that likely cost his side three points, as the Fire went down to defeat to FC Dallas 3-2 at Toyota Park.
"When you don't finish the easy chances, it can come back to haunt you, which happened today," said Fire coach Dave Sarachan.
Herron scored a 54th-minute equalizer, nutmegging Dario Sala after Nate Jaqua beat the FC Dallas offside trap with a perfect through ball. Then six minutes later he beat Sala to the near post after collecting a long ball from Diego Gutierrez and rounding FCD defender Drew Moor.
But just a couple of minutes later, with the entire goal in front of him and wide open inside the six-yard box, he skied a shot over the bar that would have given the Fire a 3-1 lead.
"Andy buried the two tough shots but missed the easiest and it went over the bar," Sarachan said. "It was a tough day -- 3 o'clock game, it was tough for both teams. Days like this your mental faculties go on you. I think the team was thinking 'We got the lead, it's a hot day, we can grind this one out,' and it didn't work that way."
The Fire players also attested to the difficulty of the heat, which registered some 109 degrees at field level. Herron referred to the heat as part of the reason he missed the easy chance.
"With the degrees on your head, I couldn't breathe -- I got lost," he said. "I got under the ball, it was a bad hit.
"You can't imagine what it was like on the field. This is one of the hottest situations I've played in and I'm from Costa Rica," he said. "It was unbelievable. You try to recover but you can't breathe."
Herron was happy about the two goals he scored but was disappointed with the loss.
"It doesn't matter if you score five goals and then lose -- we've got to win," he said. "I would feel more healthy if we won."
After falling behind to an early goal from Ramon Nunez and not creating many chances in the first half -- especially over the final 30 minutes of the half -- the Fire were pleased with how they responded to start the second.
"In the first 20 minutes of the second half we were winning. I don't know if we thought it was over, we could have killed this team off," Armas said.
"We've got to find ways to win when you're up 2-1. We should have three points. We are absolutely spent and it was all for nothing. It seemed like Dallas was dead; it came down to a couple of good counters. We don't play good enough team defense, as a team effort. The Italians won the World Cup because of it."
It was the second time this season the Fire had failed to hold a 2-1 lead against FC Dallas.
"I'm disappointed, obviously, very disappointed. We need a better mentality. We need to hang on -- that's the wrong word, but we need to hang on to these leads and add onto them," said Jaqua. "We had the victory in sight. The heat was a factor for both teams. We pushed the game and then the momentum and our mentality switched. We played well enough to win, we had the victory in sight and lost it."
In the first meeting, in the first game of the season for both teams, Chicago took a 2-1 lead in the 54th minute, only to see the Hoops come back with two goals in four minutes at home, Cooper heading home the game-winner in the 70th minute. Saturday, Cooper's 80th-minute goal meant the Fire's Texas rivals will retain the Brimstone Cup for a fourth consecutive year.
"Give them credit," Armas said. "First they had the lead, then they lost it and then came back to win it."
Jack Daniel Chavez is a contributor to MLSnet.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Soccer or its clubs.
