{"id":255625,"date":"2025-11-02T00:31:08","date_gmt":"2025-11-02T00:31:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/255625\/"},"modified":"2025-11-02T00:31:08","modified_gmt":"2025-11-02T00:31:08","slug":"philadelphia-union-3-0-chicago-fire-the-philly-soccer-page","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/255625\/","title":{"rendered":"Philadelphia Union 3 \u2013 0 Chicago Fire \u2013 The Philly Soccer Page"},"content":{"rendered":"

Photo courtesy of Philadelphia Union\u00a0<\/p>\n

Philadelphia Union punched their ticket to the Eastern Conference Semifinals in spectacular fashion, defeating Chicago Fire FC 3-0 at SeatGeek Stadium to close out their Best-of-Three first-round series. Tai Baribo struck twice within the opening 20 minutes, and Bruno Damiani added a third as the Union\u2019s relentless first-half performance sealed the result early. Andre Blake\u2019s penalty save highlighted a composed defensive effort that saw the Supporters\u2019 Shield winners comfortably advance.<\/p>\n

First Half<\/p>\n

From the opening whistle, Philadelphia looked intent on finishing the job quickly. Tai Baribo opened the scoring in the 8th minute, pressing Chicago\u2019s stand-in goalkeeper Jeffrey Gal into a costly turnover before slotting home into an empty net. Just eight minutes later, Baribo doubled the lead with a textbook header off a cross from Kai Wagner. Chicago nearly pulled one back in the 32nd minute when Brian Guti\u00e9rrez earned a penalty, but Andre Blake denied him to preserve the clean sheet. The Union capitalized on the momentum only minutes later when in the 35th, Milan Iloski\u2019s shot deflected into Damiani\u2019s path, who capitalized with a one-touch finish to the lower left corner.<\/p>\n

Second Half<\/p>\n

With the result all but secured, the Union managed the tempo through the second half, absorbing Chicago\u2019s pressure while maintaining composure. The Fire pushed forward, earning a handful of corners and long-range attempts, but none were serious enough to challenge Blake. Philadelphia rotated late, bringing on Indiana Vassilev, Chris Donovan, and Alejandro Bedoya to close out the match. The final whistle sends the Union home to Subaru Park for the remainder of their postseason, where they\u2019ll host either Charlotte FC or New York City FC the weekend of November 22 in the conference semi-final.<\/p>\n

Three Points<\/p>\n

Front-Pressing Masterclass \u2013 Philadelphia\u2019s coordinated front press forced repeated errors from Chicago\u2019s back line, leading directly to Baribo\u2019s opener and setting the rhythm for the first half.
\nWinning the Second Ball \u2013 Philly\u2019s midfielders recovered numerous loose balls, sustaining pressure and denying Chicago transitions.
\nNo Let-Up in the Windy City \u2013 Even with a three-goal cushion, the Union\u2019s defensive organization stayed sharp, limiting Chicago\u2019s efforts later on.<\/p>\n

Lineups<\/p>\n

Philadelphia Union (4-4-2):\u00a0Andre Blake, Jakob Glesnes, Nathan Harriel, Kai Wagner, Olwethu Makhanya, Jovan Lukic, Frankie Westfield, Danley Jean Jacques, Milan Iloski (Indiana Vassilev \u2013 68\u2032), Tai Baribo (Alejandro Bedoya \u2013 85\u2032), Bruno Damiani (Chris Donovan \u2013 85\u2032)<\/p>\n

Unused Substitutes: Andrew Rick, Olivier Mbaizo, Jes\u00fas Bueno, Cavan Sullivan, Ben Bender, Jeremy Rafanello<\/p>\n

Chicago Fire (4-3-3): Jeff Gal, Jack Elliott, Joel Waterman, Andrew Gutman, Jonathan Dean (Maren Haile-Selassie \u2013 HT), D\u2019Avilla Dje Tah (Tom Barlow \u2013 65\u2032), Rominigue Kouame (Mauricio Pineda \u2013 26\u2032), Brian Gutierrez, Hugo Cuypers, Jonathan Bamba, Philip Zinckernagel<\/p>\n

Unused Substitutes: Omar Gonzalez, Kellyn Acosta, Justin Reynolds, Samuel Williams, Bryan Dowd, Samual Rogers<\/p>\n

Scoring Summary:<\/p>\n

PHI: Tai Baribo \u2013 8\u2019<\/p>\n

PHI: Tai Baribo (Kai Wagner, Jovan Lukic) \u2013 16\u2032<\/p>\n

PHI: Bruno Damiani (Milan Iloski) \u2013 35\u2032<\/p>\n

Disciplinary Summary:<\/p>\n

CHI: Jonathan Bamba (Yellow \u2013 Foul) \u2013 19\u2019<\/p>\n

PHI: Danley Jean Jacques (Yellow \u2013 Poor Sportsmanship) \u2013 31\u2032<\/p>\n

PHI: Milan Iloski (Yellow \u2013 Foul) \u2013 40\u2032<\/p>\n

CHI: Dje D\u2019Avilla (Yellow \u2013 Foul) \u2013 63\u2032<\/p>\n

CHI: Maren Haile-Selassie (Yellow \u2013 Foul) \u2013 69\u2032<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\"\"
\n Author: Anna Grillo<\/a>
\n\t\t\t\t\t Anna has been finding one way or another to be involved with soccer ever since she got kicked out of little league on the first day. A Union season ticket holder, you might recognize her in Subaru Park as the super loud Italian girl whose yelling accidentally scares the kids in section 101. She doesn’t tweet, but you can occasionally find her on the Union subreddit sharing the custom shirts she makes for matches. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Photo courtesy of Philadelphia Union\u00a0 Philadelphia Union punched their ticket to the Eastern Conference Semifinals in spectacular fashion,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":255626,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,561,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-255625","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-soccer","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-soccer","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255625","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255625"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255625\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255626"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255625"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255625"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255625"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}