CHICAGO FIRE MEDIA CONFERENCE

September 11, 2021

Raphael Wicky

Press Conference

Sporting KC 2, Chicago Fire 0

Q. First goal obviously a mistake and preventible but what happened on the second one especially coming so soon after the first one?

RAPHAEL WICKY: Yeah, I'd have to see the full -- I haven't seen it on TV, the full sequence. I just remember the ball was on the sideline and then we have the one with Maur in the back where he loses the speed dual with I think Salloi, was it, I'm not sure. But I will have to see the full sequence, what we can do better there and beside of winning the one-one obviously.

Q. And the three subs at halftime, were these injured?

RAPHAEL WICKY: No one was injured. We were 2-0 down and I wanted to push the game, bring three fresh legs in, there three fresh guys in there, and try to come back. That was the thought.

Q. Obviously first six minutes, you guys were in a big hole. What did you say to the guys at halftime?

RAPHAEL WICKY: There wasn't much talk. I said we're making three stops, a few corrections how we want to go, and tell them, guys, let's try to win the second half. That's our goal. Let's try to win the second half. We drew the second half.

We had I think a few really, really good chances to come back and then you all know in football, if you comeback 2-0 is a dangerous result, if you score a goal, you're on again and yeah, we were just not able to convert the chances we created.

Q. And I know it's just happened just 45 minutes, tough first game for Navarro to come in, what did you see in him out of that half?

RAPHAEL WICKY: Of course it's not easy but I saw a lot of good things out of Federico. It's what we knew of him, winning a lot of balls. Obviously after the yellow card he had to be a little more cautious, and there were certain moments where normally I think he would go even stronger but I showed a lot of character, a lot of strength in the duels, and also with the ball some decent things.

I think it's important that he integrates now into the team, gets to know his teammates better and better and I think he will be a good addition to this team.

Q. Now are you happy with his performance overall?

RAPHAEL WICKY: Right now immediately after the game I am happy with his performance. I will watch the game again in more details, but I think he won a lot of balls there, and he was also very involved and he was decent there.

Q. You mentioned the international break was nice; do you feel you lost a little bit of momentum coming off the first rode win against New York?

RAPHAEL WICKY: Look, it's a two-week break for everyone -- or for us, for them, not. They had a game last weekend. When you come out of a two-week break, we said, guys, let's be there from the start. That was our team talk just right before we went out, and let's be there from the start. There's no time to come into the game. We had a two-week break but it's very, very important to start well. We didn't do that. We came out very poor. We actually had a big chance before, 1-0, and then obviously we know what happened in minute four and minute six.

So yeah, is that because of the two-week break? I cannot tell you that. But of course we have to come back mentally in a state that you start the game well, that's important, when you are taken a little bit out of the game rhythm.

Q. Your next game is Wednesday. How do you prepare knowing that you have another game coming up right away?

RAPHAEL WICKY: Yeah, we are going to talk about the game. We are going to regroup. We are going to get fresh again and then we go to D.C. and we start from zero. We have got to come back -- come out of the locker room obviously way better than today, and it's a game where we go with the mentality of winning. We played them. We played them there already. We lost 1-0. We know what will come to us. We played them at home, we were 2-0 up, minute 80. That's the game. It's going to be a tough game again.

But like every game in this league, we go there with the mentality of winning. Every game starts at zero and that's how we are going to go there, regroup, refresh, prepare and go and take the next opportunity.