Fire U-17/18 blank Internationals to capture first home victory

By Curt Herron

During a division season in which they've trailed during nearly every match, Saturday was a refreshing change for the Fire Academy's U-17/18 team.

Chicago jumped out to an early lead and then controlled play in its Great Lakes Division match with the Internationals before claiming a 2-0 win.

It was just the second win for the Fire (2-3-2, 8 points) in division play and the first triumph in four outings at Toyota Park's practice field.

Saturday's script played out in a similar fashion to the team's previous division victory, when they jumped out to a 2-0 lead and beat Sockers FC.

But unlike that effort, the Fire were able to post a shutout, something which they had only done previously in a scoreless draw at Indiana United.

Jacob Brindle gave the hosts the lead for good during the 14th minute and then Luis Medina contributed an insurance score during the 54th minute.

Keeper Zak Allen recorded the shutout with the support of defenders Peter Beasley, David Caban, Lalo Cuautle, Anthony Torres and Keaton Albert.

"We came out playing to win and all did a very good job," Cuautle said. "We played our game today. which is playing soccer and not just knocking the ball around, and there's a lot of teams out there that can't do what we do.

"We've had games where we can't score and that's been a big problem for us. And some times we've let some silly goals in in the back, and that also has killed us. So it was good that we were able to finish our work today."

The Internationals (3-2-3, 12 points) entered the day as one of the leaders in the division, but were hurt by the absence of some key players.

Chicago set the tone early with a liner from Victor Pineda, a short try from Medina and a corner by Cuautle punched away in the opening minutes.

Right after that sequence the Fire finally connected when Pineda sent a pass to Brindle, who readjusted on a short attempt which found the net.

"We've been struggling the last couple of weeks so it was good for us to play like this and get the win," Brindle said. "We definitely feel that we deserved a couple of more wins that we let slip away, but that's our fault.

"We were able to work the ball side to side and that opened up a lot of things. We could have finished a couple more, but we'll take it. We hope that if we can platy like this that it will set us to do well in the future."

Later in the first half, keeper Jacob Russell dove to stop a free kick from Brady Wahl and Pineda was just wide on a try just before the break.

It was more of the same during the second half, especially after the Fire put together a nice sequence which resulted in their final score.

Wahl started things with a pass to Daniel Lojek, who crossed the ball to Medina, who put in a close-range shot to give the hosts a 2-0 lead.

About midway through the half, Manny Guzman lined a try off the crossbar and Lojek sent the rebound to Brindle, who was denied on his attempt.

The Cleveland-area squad nearly avoided the shutout when Yanni Sarris' liner bounced off of the crossbar with about 15 minutes remaining.

Shortly before time expired, Pineda sent a pass to Albert, whose shot try was denied by the Internationals' keeper, who made a kick save.

"This is what we've been looking for in the games before this one," Pineda said. "We finally put things together and I think a big part of that was the energy that we brought from the start of the game. We were all ready.

"I think everyone knew that once we scored the first goal that we all just had to keep playing the same way. We haven't had a good start in our home games. We'd been trying to turn that around and today was good for us."