The Fire won their first U.S. Open Cup match of the year, a 2-0 victory at the Charlotte Eagles of the United Soccer Leagues Professional Division. Some notes from the game:
- Paolo Tornaghi made his 2013 debut in the match as Sean Johnson was on National Team duty.
- It didn’t take long, but Mike Magee is officially on the board in his Fire career. In the 11th minute, the newcomer acquired for Robbie Rogers from the Los Angeles Galaxy and a Chicago native, Magee scored the opening goal of the match.
- And encouraging sign, Rolfe scored in the fifty-seventh minute to close out the scoring in the 2-0 win. Rolfe’s goal was his first in U.S. Open Cup history for the main team, though he had another in 2004 with the Reserves.
The Fire will host Columbus in their next match at Toyota Park. The match will start at 7:30 PM on June 12th. Fire coach Frabnk Klopas was reluctant to look too far ahead to the match, as he told reporters that “We shift our focus back to the league and D.C. United for Sunday now but we’re looking forward to getting to play this tournament at our home stadium against a rival in Columbus.”
The Fire’s next league match will be against D.C. United on Sunday, June 2nd at 4:00 PM at Toyota Park. Including the upcoming Open Cup match against Columbus, the D.C. game will start a stretch of four games at home. The Fire will not play another road match until June 22nd at Columbus, setting aside a potential road match in the tournament that has yet to be scheduled.
Despite having a rare opportunity to see MLS Soccer, the Eagles only sold 1,562 tickets for the match, which is not rare for an early round of the tournament.