BRIDGEVIEW, Ill. – The playing surface at Toyota Park has come under some criticism in recent weeks, but Chicago Fire veteran Gonzalo Segares doesn’t believe it is to blame for the club’s lack of success at home this year.
Injured striker Mike Magee spoke out on Twitter after the club’s 3-3 draw with D.C. United on Saturday, saying trying to play soccer at the venue was like “trying to play hockey with a football.”
The Fire are tenants of the stadium, which is owned and maintained by the Village of Bridgeview, and the club must share the rented space with other events such as high school soccer, football, rugby, concerts and Mexican rodeos.
And with this summer being the wettest on record, the playing surface has suffered, so much so that large sections were re-sodded before the Fire’s 1-1 tie with Toronto FC on Sept. 13.
“In all the years that I have been here it’s definitely the worst that I’ve seen it. It’s always been a very good field, very level, but it’s never this muddy,” veteran left-back Segares said after practice on Friday. “But this is what we have right now, these are the circumstances we are playing with. I don’t see any excuse for us to blame it on the field.
“I think it’s been like that all year long, but both teams are playing on it. We both have to get accustomed to it,” he added. “If that’s the pitch we have to play on, then we’re going to play on that. … So it’s definitely different, but we have to have the same mentality when we play here.”
The Fire travel to Houston for Sunday’s clash with the Dynamo and to Philadelphia on Thursday before returning to Toyota Park for a match against Montreal Impact on Oct. 5.
Striker Quincy Amarikwa, who tops the Fire scoring charts with eight regular-season goals, also admitted the pitch “could be better” but acknowledged it’s up to the players to adapt to whatever the conditions may be.
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“I think conditions make a difference regardless of what the conditions are, whether it’s field condition, a poor pitch or turf, playing in the rain or playing in the snow,” Amarikwa said. “Every game is different, every weather condition, especially across this league, is different, so it does make a difference.
“I’m not a groundskeeper or a fieldsman, my job is to come out and play. If the pitch could be better, I’m all for that, but I’m not paying that bill.”
Fire head coach Frank Yallop said the conditions were "not great at all" after the draw against Toronto, but added that the field's quality is out of the team's control.
"They play football games, high school soccer games, and all that stuff on our field. We have no control over that," he said. "The stadium has control of it. We rent the field, so they do whatever they need to do on it to make money. We're at the mercy of that, and that's what we get; not a great surface.”
