CHICAGO FIRE MEDIA CONFERENCE

October 18, 2025

Philip Zinckernagel

Press Conference

New England 2, Chicago Fire FC 2

Q. You could have had as high as sixth place had you guys won the game. You have to settle for a home wild card game. All things considered, you still get 8th place and still have a game at home on Wednesday. What's the overall sentiment?

PHILIP ZINCKERNAGEL: Like you say, overall, it's been a good season. But right now, a little bit disappointed in the performance of the team, of myself. Today we didn't play good enough first half, and I do think we did a better second half and came back.

But we had some chances we should have buried. So disappointed but overall, I guess it's been a pretty good season.

Q. And a great moment with your goal after the 80th minute to claw back level. Can you talk about that moment and when you saw there?

PHILIP ZINCKERNAGEL: Smart pass from Maren, I think, and then just connection with Hugo. Sometimes you've just got to not think and do something. Luckily, I have a about connection with Hugo and good pass back. Just kind of smashed it in because I was a little bit angry that I missed the first chance.

But yeah, great goal. Yeah, we shouldn't let in a goal afterwards, but that's another story.

Q. How do you think that the struggles, just for hitting the target was through the team until you scored. What do you think contributed to that tightness and frustration, or was it knowing that this was such a big game for the team?

PHILIP ZINCKERNAGEL: Good question. Maybe the pitch, also. It's actually a great pitch. I think it was really wet and fast today, which is good normally for us, but if you are not used to it, it can be a little bit of surprise. You saw that on the first goal, one of our most technical players, take a touch -- and it's just a faster pitch. So if you're not used to it, you get caught a little bit.

We should have been better to adapting to it but maybe that's one of the reasons.

Q. And just this team fights back at the end again. What does it say about this group that they were able to get a point?

PHILIP ZINCKERNAGEL: Great spirit. Like Gregg said after the game, there's stuff we can be proud about, especially second half. It wasn't a perfect game, but it kind of gave us some sort of belief and momentum that we can get back into games and maybe this is what we needed, you know, a little wake-up call before the playoff game.

But yeah, I love that about our team; that we are able to get back into games but I wish we didn't have.

Q. Orlando said they got destroyed today and you had a pretty good day last time you played against them. Thoughts on that opponent?

PHILIP ZINCKERNAGEL: It's a great team. They have some really good offensive players but I think the way they play could fit us. So yeah, it's going to be exciting. Hopefully it will be two offensive teams meeting each other, and then, yeah, a lot of goals.