BRIDGEVIEW, lll. – Thursday was a bittersweet night for Fire rookie right back Steven Kinney.
Although Kinney was impressive in his MLS debut, Chicago couldn’t pull out the result in a 1-0 loss to defending champion Real Salt Lake at Toyota Park.
“It’s good to get out there, but you want the team to do well,” said Kinney, who played collegiately at Elon University in Elon, N.C. “It’s got to start coming together for us sooner or later.”
Kinney, who started because of injuries to right backs Tim Ward and Dasan Robinson, certainly did well individually. He played the full 90 minutes against Real Salt Lake, looking strong in defense and getting forward early and often.
Two of Kinney’s ventures forward nearly resulted in a Fire goal. Kinney twice hit the post Thursday night, heading Mike Banner corner kicks off the upright in the 48th and 57th minutes.
“I’m very happy with Steve,” Fire coach Carlos de los Cobos said. “Everybody’s very happy for Stevey. We have a potential player with him in this position, he supports [the offense] all the time and he returned to fight [defensively]. I’m very happy for him.”
Fire center back C.J. Brown, who played next to Kinney for the majority of the match, echoed de los Cobos’ sentiments.
“I think as the game went on he got real comfortable,” Brown said. “He handled it very well. He was up the field shooting, crossing, and he was defending. He played the whole game hard; he was in the right spots. I thought he played very well.”
But Kinney wasn’t the Fire’s only rookie defender to impress on Thursday night. Center back Kwame Watson-Siriboe – who started because of de los Cobos’ decision to play traditional center back Wilman Conde in the midfield – made his second appearance of the year last night, going the full 90 minutes and defending solidly.
“He’s not far off, he’s right there,” Brown said of Watson-Siriboe. “I think the more games he sees, the more patterns and movements of the forwards he’ll see and he’ll be real comfortable. He’s big in the air, he’s got legs that can get around guys, he can tackle, he can defend, and now it’s just about reading and communicating, and that’s not far off. He’s pretty close.”
