History of the Chicago Fire, MLS Franchise

The Chicago Fire are one of the many professional soccer clubs that participate in Major League Soccer. Major League Soccer is the largest professional soccer league in the United States and Canada. The league itself is only ten years old and was founded in 1995, but it is growing fast. The Chicago Fire are based out of Bridgeview, Illinois and were founded on October 8^th 1997. This was actually the same date as the 126^th anniversary of the Great Chicago Fire. The Chicago Fire are by far one of the most successful Major League Soccer Clubs in North America.

In fact, during their first season in Major League Soccer the club was able to win the MLS Cup. The Fire are the only team that has managed to win an MLS Cup during their first season in Major League Soccer. The Chicago Fire also managed to win the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup during their first year in the league. By winning the MLS Cup as well as the Lamar Hunt US Open Cup it is said that the Fire have won the "Double." The Chicago Fire are also the only team to have ever won the double during their opening year in Major League Soccer.

There are several different historic games that the Chicago Fire have played in that you may be interested to hear about. The first game that the Chicago Fire ever played in was on March 21, 1998 against the Miami Fusion. This first game was played at Lockheart Stadium where the Fire beat the Miami Fusion by a score of 2-0. The largest margin of victory that the Chicago Fire had was against the Kansas City Wizards. This game was played at Arrow Head stadium where the Chicago Fire managed to defeat the Wizards by a score of 7-0. The largest margin of defeat that the fire have ever been defeated by was the against the New England Revolution at Gillete Stadium. At this game, the Fire lost by a score of 5-1 in Massachusetts.

The Chicago Fire currently play at Toyota Park in Bridgeview, Illinois. This soccer specific stadium is capable of holding 20,000 soccer fans at any given time. Most MLS fans put the Chicago Fire down as favorites for making the MLS playoffs each and every year. However, only time will tell if the Fire are going to be successful in future MLS seasons.

The source for the information of this article is http://chicago.fire.mlsnet.com/t100/, the official website of the Chicago Fire.