D.C. United forward Christian Benteke will look to take the lead in the Golden Boot race and help his squad move into a playoff spot when they visit the Chicago Fire on Saturday.
Benteke has 17 goals, tied with Real Salt Lake’s Cristian Arango for most in MLS and more than five times than that of his closest teammates. Cristian Dajome, Gabriel Pirani and Jared Stroud are tied for second on D.C. with just three goals apiece.
“When I started the season, I wanted to play well to make sure that we win football matches and I score goals,” Benteke said. “The fight has always been against me, not against anyone else. I always challenge myself to be a better player … and then at the end of the day, we will see who is going to be the best goal scorer. This is not something I obsess about, but obviously I’m aware of it.”
D.C. United (7-12-8, 29 points) enters Saturday having won three of their past four regular-season matches after an 11-match winless streak (0-8-3). The club sits two points below the playoff line with seven matches remaining.
“I’ve been here for two years now. I played against a lot of teams, and I have the feeling that we can compete against them,” Benteke said. “It’s about some details that cost us a lot of points — I think we dropped more than 20 points (from leading positions). So that means we can score goals, we can lead. But now, it’s how we can hold on to those results.”
Things haven’t been going as well for the Fire (6-13-8, 26 points), who are 0-2-1 in their past three regular-season matches and have won only once in their past six (1-3-2).
Though second-to-last in the Eastern Conference table, Chicago sits five points behind Atlanta for the final playoff spot with four teams between them — including D.C. United.
“We want to dictate the tempo,” defender Andrew Gutman said. “We want to be on the front foot, we want to control the game. But then on the other side of it, we do have to be aware of their attacking throughout that they have.”
The two sides played to a 1-1 draw the last time they met on May 25 in Washington, D.C.
Homegrown midfielder Brian Gutierrez is second on the Fire with a career-high six goals, including two in his past four matches.
–Field Level Media
