KANSAS CITY, Kan. – As the Chicago Fire’s three-game winning streak came to an end, head coach Frank Yallop and captain Jeff Larentowicz were left to rue a couple of controversial late refereeing decisions which saw Sporting Kansas City emerge narrow 1-0 winners at Sporting Park.
Having found an answer for everything Sporting threw at them during an absorbing, action-packed 73 minutes, the final quarter saw the visitors’ otherwise stellar work unravel after Paulo Nagamura’s 74th-minute header.
As the Fire pressed forward in search of the equalizer they believed their efforts deserved, referee Jose Carlos Rivero first sent David Accam off for an apparent hand to the face of former Fire defender Jalil Anibaba in the 89th minute, before Larentowicz saw calls for a penalty turned away in stoppage time.
“I’m still trying to work out why David got sent off and Jeff didn’t have a penalty kick,” Yallop told reporters at the post-match press conference. “I haven’t seen the replays so I can’t really get into it, but it looked a penalty kick from where I’m sitting.”
While Larentowicz also felt that Accam’s dismissal was harsh – “He’s not that kind of player,” he said – the Fire captain did feel that his protests on the late penalty call were justified after he collided with SKC defender Matt Besler in the box just before the final whistle.
“It felt like I got there first, but they said that Besler got there first,” Larentowicz told MLSsoccer.com. “I haven’t seen it yet, but it certainly felt one way to me, but the referee and the linesmen were pretty confident, said the same thing, so we leave it at that.”
The calls were tough on a Fire side that brought the game to their opponents, and if not for the intervention of the superb Tim Melia in goal, might have earned the point Yallop believed his side deserved.
“I thought we deserved a draw out of the game, to be honest,” the Fire coach said. “And I think [SKC coach Peter Vermes] would probably say the same thing.”
How this entertaining game remained scoreless for 74 minutes is anyone’s guess, with the Fire registering an impressive 11 shots to the home side’s 14 and strikers Guly do Prado and Quincy Amarikwa both denied by the alert Melia.
“We had enough chances to have scored at least a goal,” Yallop said. “We had some nicks and stuff around the goal, Guly had a good chance that the ’keeper had a good save on. But it’s frustrating to play well in the second half in a place like this that’s difficult to come to. To play pretty well and not get nothing out of it is a little frustrating.”
