CHICAGO FIRE MEDIA CONFERENCE

May 18, 2022

Zherdan Shaqiri

Press Conference

New York Red Bulls 3, Chicago Fire FC 3

Q. What's the mood around the team after you fought back and were able to get a late goal to seemingly get the win but then gave up the late equalizer. What's the mood around the team after that game?

ZHERDAN SHAQIRI: Obviously disappointed because we came here to win the game and in the end, yeah, really disappointed how we concede the ball in the last minute, because we have to do better with this.

In general, it was a positive game for us because the last few games were not so good. We didn't have like positive results, so it was a good step again in the right direction, and yeah, that was okay. But of course we need to do better and we need to learn from our mistakes because we are doing too much mistakes at the moment and we have to learn from these mistakes and to do of course better to manage this game, obviously we have to win because we score before, we just before the 90 minutes we score the 3-2 and extra time they score.

We have to do better with this but the guy, they know it, and yeah, we will do for sure better the next time. But in the end, we take that draw, one point, and we keep going. We have another game on Sunday.

Q. Obviously there were some mistakes but what do you think went well for the team tonight?

ZHERDAN SHAQIRI: To be honest, you can see, the new players came in. There is some quality there, and you can see how many chances we create offensively, and, yeah, you have also a lot of positive things to take from this game obviously, and how I say before from the mistakes, we have to learn, and yeah, we have to do better as a team, as a collective, everybody, and then I'm sure we will win games again and we are going to go in the right direction but offensively you saw how we fought back and we came back in front of Red Bull 3-2. You can see that the mentality is good.

But still we have to work on and we have to learn from our mistakes to manage these kind of games and to win these kind of games.

Q. Some of the mistakes from Gaga, what advice do you give to a player as one of the more experienced players in the team?

ZHERDAN SHAQIRI: Look, Gaga, he's young, and he needs to learn also he's not, he's not only zealot (ph) so he will make mistakes. This is pretty normal. He have always our support. He will learn from his mistakes. He saved us a lot, so yeah, he will learn for sure and we are going to keep going. We are going to help him every time he needs and yeah, we are behind him. We are going to help him and I'm pretty sure he's going to manage that well, and yeah, he's going to -- yeah, do his work again in the next game and he's going to make -- help us a lot. So I'm pretty sure he learn from these mistakes.

Q. How would you evaluate your performance tonight? Would you say it was your best so far in Fire uniform? And in general, how would you say you've been performing this season? How would you evaluate your performance this year?

ZHERDAN SHAQIRI: Very early to speak about my performances my friend, because we have already 11, only 11 games left. We played 11 games, so it's just in the beginning of the season. So it's I think early to speak about my performance. But you can see in not only today but a few games, quality and I'm here to help this team go forward. Until now, I'm hungry for more and I know that everybody need to do better because our expectation is high. Yeah, I'm trying my best. I'm trying to help these young players, too, because we are also young and need to learn from our mistakes. So I try to help them, too, in every sense on and off the pitch but yeah, it's very early to speak about my performance, my friend.

Q. You guys have only a couple days off or in training and then you go back to New York again and play New York City. Is this quick turnaround a good thing, do you think, for the team right now or a bad thing?

ZHERDAN SHAQIRI: No, I think it's good thing because you have another chance to, yeah, to show up and to do better. So I like it, too, this way and to play a few games in a row because, yeah, you can be in a rhythm and you can react again and do better from your previous games. So there is another day, another chance to improve and to try to get points, so we don't have a lot of time to think about this game, so we have to think about forward and yeah, I'm pretty sure the boys going to be ready on Sunday.