Chicago Fire's Lampson happy to credit teammates
Goalkeeper Matt Lampson is as good at deflecting credit for the Chicago Fire's current shutout streak as he is at deflecting the shots that would have ended that streak.
"Three (consecutive) shutouts goes to the team, not to me," Lampson said after training Thursday. "That's a team streak."
Lampson - with his teammates - has gone 356 minutes without giving up a goal, a streak dating to a 1-1 draw at Orlando City SC on March 11. They will try to break the team record in the first half of Saturday's home match against Montreal (4 p.m., Comcast SportsNet-Plus).
"I love after every clean sheet we had this year, (Lampson) said credit to the team," Fire coach Veljko Paunovic said. "And that's how it is. All the team works defensively."
The streak comes as a surprise, considering the Fire gave up 4 goals in the season opener against New York City FC. It has allowed just 1 goal since.
"I think that just shows how much of an anomaly the first game was," said Lampson, who made 8 saves in last weekend's rematch at NYCFC. "We let ourselves down. We let the fans down. We were embarrassed at the performance. It wasn't who we were.
"Especially how well we did in the preseason, it wasn't who we were. Luckily, we hopefully got that out of the way the first game of the season. Defensively since then it's been fantastic."
Lampson expects the strong defensive play to continue.
"We're really getting into a rhythm now," he said. "Having the same back line now for the past few of games, I think that helps a lot. And just having time. It's really hard to build a team in two months of preseason.
"Teams take time. Great teams take even longer. So for us to be so successful this quickly is a testament to our leadership, our front office and our coaching staff and the players that we have, the type of characters we have on the team."
Drogba watch:
Coach Veljko Paunovic said he's planning as if the Fire will see legendary forward Didier Drogba play for Montreal this weekend.
Drogba has played just 20 minutes this season (March 19 at FC Dallas), but he has been training with Montreal this week and could see the Toyota Park grass as a favorable surface for his 38-year-old legs. The warm weather forecast for Saturday might also entice Drogba.
"We are expecting that there may be changes in their lineup," Paunovic said, "so we are working on both teams, with Drogba, without Drogba."
Accam watch:
Speedy Fire midfielder David Accam missed training again Thursday, so it's likely he will miss a fourth consecutive match because of a knee strain. That's a problem for the Fire, because Accam is the team's most dangerous attacking player. The Fire has scored just 2 goals in the last four games.
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