SoccerWise - Gregg Berhalter (Chicago Fire) On Winning Formula In MLS, Talking Tactics w/USMNT, Big Name Hunting & Much More

Episode Date: December 28, 2025

Soccerwise was lucky to sit-down with Chicago's Director of Football & Head Coach Gregg Berhalter as the offseason begins. He talks with David about his time with the USMNT, the special season his son had, what wins in MLS, the potential of big name additions in Chicago, and much more.

Well, we have a little time here in the off season at Soccer Wise, and we love to talk to the people around the game who are making things happen to the people who find most interesting to talk soccer with it. And there's no one higher on that list than the director of football and the head coach of the Chicago fire. Craig, we're a halter. Greg, thanks for being here. Yeah, you're welcome. Nice to hear from you. So let's start looking back. What is your favorite moment of 2025? When you, you know, as you get to the end of the year and you look back on your first year with the club, what comes to mind?

That's a great question. I think there's a lot of good moments. But, you know, it's like anything, like any season, you know, it's a roller coaster. And that's the fun part about it. You know, MLS is such a tough league. You know, if you think about our team, in particular, we won nine games away from home and, you know, and six at home. It just doesn't make any type of sense. So, you know, you could imagine if you won six games at home, there's 11 that you didn't win.

You either got a tie or a loss. And that in itself was extremely frustrating, I think, for everybody. But I have to say, the fans, you know, stuck with us and they were behind us. you know, I think they enjoyed some of the football that was being played and, you know, and we want to do better at home. But I think so, you know, that was certainly a low point. Some of the high points were, you know, some of the road wins we had, some of the, you know, some of the watching the team build, watching the team grow throughout the year.

And we got to a good point towards the end of the season. For you, it was the first time you were back on the field day in and day out in seven years. I know that was something you were excited about. What was the experience like to be back on the grass? It's amazing. I think you forget about it. You know, when you're with the national team, it's also such a rewarding job. But, you know, there's nothing like working with a team day in and day out and seeing the progress and seeing players develop and seeing the tactical understanding grow and being able to make small adjustments that have an impact because the guys really, you know, are two.

into what's happening. So to me, that the whole process was really, really great. How have you seen yourself change as a coach coming out of the seven years in a different setting and now back into that day to day? Yeah, well, you remember me from Columbus and it was really only about, you know, how we played. That was so, so important to us. You know, the national team, you know, really helped me with the importance of winning and, and expectations, you know. And so I think now with Chicago, it's a combination. You know, we push the guys really hard. We challenge them really hard because we know what's in them.

And, you know, we want to play a certain way. And we also, you know, want to get the results. And we're focused on getting a result each and every time we're on the field. It's interesting you say that because I said a lot of times, we heard your language as national team coach shift from tactical to about spirit and fight and belief, which it felt like it was a reality of you could only affect so much, as often as you're with those players is that sort of the case you know that's part of it but i think we we we grew over time to a very good understanding by the player pool of what we're trying to do

so i think that that's the case but i also started to realize that people don't give a crap about your tactics you know so like it's it's it's wasting time all they want to do is see you win you know and and i can talk about you know how we use tyler as an inverted you know right back playing center mid early on in 2019, people don't give a crap about that. They want to see you win, and that's all they care about. So I purposely backed off of the tactical talk, probably in like the fall of 2019. Yeah. Interesting.

Because we saw that happen from the outside, but we're sort of processing it differently. But we're the ones who care. So we're the ones who are the ones who are. Yeah, exactly. You're the ones that didn't get any of the good information. Exactly. Now with Chicago. Yeah.

How do you see your tactical identity right now? because one of the big stories this year was you guys were a great attacking team, but struggled defensively, which wasn't the case for your teams in the past. Yeah, that was frustrating. But not a lot different from the early days of Columbus. You know, we weren't great defensively. I think we got to a point we were really good. With the national team, we were good defensively.

It was frustrating. A lot of it had to do with personnel changing and, you know, for the choice. I think backline, lack of continuity, and then midfield, some, you know, the choices that we made in midfield because we wanted to be an attacking team. And when you make those choices, you know, something has to give. And so we suffered a little bit defensively. It's something we want to improve on next year. We have to improve on next year if we want to be, you know, in the conversation for one of the better teams in MLS. So we'll focus on that.

And I think, you know, for me, I think about, you know, our identity a lot. And, you know, it's, you know, I don't think it stands out necessarily, but I don't think it needs to stand out. I think if we're proficient in each phase of the game and we understand, you know, we want to be a team that controls the ball, we want to build from the back, we want to be able to create attacks through disorganizing the opponent. defensively, we want to be able to win the ball back as soon as possible. I think if we can do those things, you know, will be effective. And that's what's really important. It's interesting because there's a conversation around Major League Soccer because it's a salary cap league of what wins.

Is it being solid and consistent or is it these outlier teams where you have a San Diego and a Philadelphia who are on the two extremes? Do you feel like the road forward is that middle of the road of just being solid in every phase? Well, I mean, let's take a look at all. as an example, right? They're leading the Premier League. You know, what's their identity? Sad pieces? It doesn't stand out, though, right? When you watch them play, you don't say, hey, they're an outlier, right? Yeah. They just do things really well. And I think that's when you start to look at top soccer nowadays, that's what's happening. You know, there's not too many

teams that have this really unique identity that you say, wow, I've never seen anything like this before. I mean, give San Diego credit. I think they did. Philadelphia definitely does. as you said. But at the end of the day, both those teams didn't win the MLS Cup. Yeah. How would you look at, though, a style for a supporter shield versus style for a knockout tournament setup? Yeah, it's a good question. You know, I think that I think that what I've seen in MLS is a lot of teams have an identity of what they're trying to do, which I think is really positive. When you come to a knockout type of tournament, you know, anything can happen.

And it's really about, you know, the performance of that night. And you think about San Diego is a great example. I mean, they played really well all year. But the game against Vancouver, they had a really poor game. You know, they weren't good in any phase of the game. And it was really unlike, you know, their performance throughout the season. And I think Vancouver benefited from playing in all those competitions, understanding what knockout was, and were really efficient and strong in those.

moments. You brought up Vancouver, so I have to ask. I think one of the coolest stories of the year, of course, was your son, Sebastian Burrhalter, his performances. What was the year like for you as a dad and as a fan? Well, you know, I rewind back to last offseason. You know, we were in Naples for the offseason. I think we were playing golf. And he talked about, he said to me, Dad, I think, you know, next year's going to be my year. And, you know, he's like, I just, I feel like I'm ready and it really you know struck me that he was that confident what he was saying but I was also like okay well why do you think that you know like anybody can just say that but you know like what are you doing here and he's like he's like I'm prepared like I'm prepared and confident going into preseason and

it was you know really interesting because they had a new coach so you don't know what the new coach is going to bring you know but he I still think he had enough confidence in him and himself and enough belief in his process that he felt like he was prepared to have a good season. And to see it play out, I think, is the way it did is really rewarding because I know how much hard work he's put in over the years. Does it change your perspective in your job at all, experiencing him now? Obviously, you played yourself, but experiencing him now from the other side? A little bit. I mean, I think that you know I'm a lot I think more cautious with late developers you know I think we as coaches you tend to think okay if this guy's not in the moment right now then he's never going to you know

he's never going to make it whereas Sebastian if you would have said that and I think he did have one of his coaches say listen you're you're not you're never going to be a starter in MLS you know and so for us we have to take a step back and really look at everything with this with this athlete you know where is he at from a developmental standpoint what's his tactical understanding what's his mentality like and then then you i think you can make a more informed decision one of the big roles for you as director of football but also in chicago is youth development and the talent pool that is around you it hasn't been maybe as successful as people would have liked with the history chicago has as a soccer city in light of that and what you're talking about

with Sebastian, how have you sort of gone about working the academy into what you do and building the pipeline? You know, that's something I'm so excited about, you know, working with the kids where, you know, you go out and you see these 13-year-olds, you know, one trip they travel with the first team to games and just seeing how much potential these young kids have. And, you know, we hired some good coaches and we have, you know, a director of methodology that's really in tune with what we're doing as a club. And I think it's going to help. You know, if you look at Chicago over the course of its history, you know, we've had some homegrowns that have done well, right? Gaga, we sold for $15 million.

Georgie Mihailovich was, you know, so, but I agree with you. It needs to be more consistent, you know, to really develop players. We also, you know, believe it or not, we set the record for homegrown minutes this year of any club in the history of MLS. That's crazy, right, to think about? it helps when your goalkeeper every single game is giving you no that's true and gouti and but sergio origel maricio peneda christopher cubs chipped in you know andrew gutman played every every single game so you know you start to have you know guys that are making an impact but i think we want to we you know we want to be developing we think this is a great market

really um you know soccer town and we want to be really developing the kids the local kids um Brian gutieres we get the official news that he's moved to Jivas. What was the story for him this year and what do you sort of make of what his future potential is? You know, so we made the decision to play him as an eight in a four three three and we challenged him. You know, we said, listen, we know this isn't going to be easy for you. We know you're going to have to do some work that you've never done before and give him credit. You know, he hung in there and I think he had a solid year, you know, 10 goals, six assists, scored some big goals for us.

And, you know, so that's what we wanted to see. We wanted to see how can this player adapt. You know, when you look at teams like, you know, Liverpool, when you look at some of their midfielers, you know, they're not the typical midfielders that you would think, right? You know, it's McCalliser or Sobesai. So, you know, we thought we could do it with him. And, you know, he developed and he got to a good point.

And I think now the next step for him is to leave the club. He's been here for 16 years. You know, that's a long time, you know. And we just felt that, you know, for him to take the next step in his career, he has to, you know, to leave the nest, so to speak. And, you know, it's always a sad moment because, you know, we're, you know, we love Guti. We love his contribution to this club over time. But we think it's going to be a great opportunity for him.

The big addition in your attack last year was Philip Zincranago, where maybe everyone thought we'd only be talking to. Jonathan Bomba, Philip Zingrenagel, a special year. What is it that he brought to the team? What is it that makes him so special? You know, similar to Andreas Dreyer where they're just so calm in the penalty box. You know, like even in training, he scores all the time, you know,

and it's that proficiency in the penalty box that really sets them apart. You know, besides that, he's a lot faster than people think. He's one of the fastest players on our team. Interesting. Yeah, and he can get going. He's great in offensive transition. And he's a good one-v-one attacker. So he's got a ton of qualities to make him, you know,

really strong player in this league. A lot of the questions I'm asking you is about sort of one half of your job, director of football and the other half head coach. What was the balance like for you between the two roles and how you operate on both sides? I think it was pretty good. You know, there were there's times where, you know, I get bogged down in the coach's office and I hear it from, you know,

people in the organization like, oh, we haven't seen it a little bit. You know, but, you know, we have a great leadership team in the club, and, you know, hopefully it's set up that, you know, I don't have to be there for every decision. You know, we have, you know, sporting director, we have a director, head of strategy, we have a GM, we have a head of recruitment, and we have a head of performance. So, you know, that's really the leaders in the team, and we're really trying to set up a strong club from top to bottom. It feels like when you look at Philip Zingernagel's resume and you talk about the members of the team, Greg Braw. is a huge part of what you're doing. I was lucky enough to sit in a talk that he gave at a youth development forum. Can you tell people a little bit about how he operates and sort of what he's brought to the club? You know, I went over to England and was visiting clubs there

and I had the opportunity to visit with Blackburn. And, you know, he was one of the most thoughtful people that I came across in England in terms of having, you know, a process. You know how England can get. I'm sure you saw some of the some of the, some of the, documentary Sunville Until I Die and stuff like that. But, you know, some of these clubs, they don't work with a process at all, you know, and it's literally, they're going day by day. And with him, you know, they had values, they had a vision, they had a mission, they had, you know, great work with the recruitment, great work with academy, they're using data. And so I met him and we came in contact, we stayed in contact. And when this opportunity

came across, you know, I asked him to, if he'd be interested in applying for the sporting director job and he's just really thoughtful um you know he's you know in direct control of the the second team in the academy he's very active with transfers with the first team um and i think a great asset for the club when you look at the reality in chicago versus your time in columbus it feels very different for a lot of different reasons i'll start with this one the i'm going to call it the big game hunting we're not connected to namar and and kevin de broina very often in columbus What's that experience like in Chicago and how do you handle what could be this big face of the club signing? You know, I'm excited about that prospect because, you know, it's always great to work with top players.

That's the first thing. You know, they have solutions that you can't even think of as a coach. You know, I think it helps your management skills to be able to manage top talent. You know, I experience that with the national team, but at the club level, You know, it would be nice, you know, nice to experience that. The other thing is, you know, we think there's a, Chicago is a huge market. And, you know, it's ripe for, you know, to have a top player here and a big name here. So, you know, we're open to that.

We don't want to sacrifice, you know, what we value and who we are as a group and what we embody. So, you know, it has to be the right fit as well. But we're certainly open to, you know, one of these names coming in and really driving not only Chicago, but the rest of Major League Soccer. It feels like this type of signing in the history of MLS goes two ways. One is the player finds the club because they're ready in their career and they're thinking about it. The other is the club goes and finds the player. Do you have a wish list of 10 Ballandor finalists that you're consistently checking up on it or is it just, if it happens, it happens? No, we're doing a lot of work behind the scenes.

you know, to, you know, to realize this, this goal of bringing a player in. So it's, you know, it's a ton of work. But again, I think it will be worth it for the club and the league. For 2026, as you talk to the players and talk to the team, what is the stated goals? What is, you know, what are you looking at for this year for the Chicago Fire? Well, we have to improve. You know, for us, it was a great learning experience. especially towards the end of the season, you know, when the intensity ramps up, you know,

in those final games, I felt like mentally, you know, we weren't present enough to actually beat Philly. And, you know, you go to Philly, you play a great game, you tie 2-2, you lose in penalty kicks, and then what's next, right? The next step is you win the home game. It has to be, you know, and we lost that game in strange fashion. But to me, it's about, you know, the mentality. And for us, you know, you have to attack each game.

I think we did a good job of treating each game as its own opportunity. And that's what we have to do next year, but really attacking it with, you know, with high intensity. You've already made some big changes on the back line. Joel Waterman came in and felt like that was a fairly opportunistic move to make. And now Mbocazi coming over from South Africa. What is that add to your team? What is the necessity there in obviously the centerback position? him. Yeah, so we needed to get better defensively. So we addressed that, bringing Joel in, and he made a big impact in a short period of time. And then we said, okay, what does it look like next? And we were able to, you know, to land, I think, one of the top talents in Africa right now as a centerback. You know, 20 years old, captain of Orlando Pirates, you know, was starting for the national team. There was a little turmoil recently. But, you know, just tremendous.

talent. And, you know, he's a guy that despite his size, you know, he's not the tallest player is amazing physicality, great mentality, and battles. So we're looking forward to him and his contribution. And then we have Christopher Cups, you know, a 17-year-old, you know, he's already played four games in MLS as a 16-year-old. I mean, that's pretty phenomenal. And we're looking forward to him getting more game time as well. Is the idea maybe a back- three to bring a lot of these guys into the starting lineup you know the way I don't know if you saw last year but we we had we did go to you know back three at times yep and for me it's not really getting hung up on the system it's really about you know how how we how we occupy space how we

close space defensively and you know if we feel like the opponent is forcing us to you know to have an extra defender because of how they're positioned then we'll add an extra defender and if not you know, we'll play with four. And so I think it can be, you know, really versatile. One of the things I wanted to ask you because you, you know, you've been around the game for a while here in North America. Obviously, your time at the national team, you're watching a lot, now back into it day to day. What do you make of the changes in Major League Soccer, the development? And is it maybe where you thought it would be if I asked you the day you left Columbus? You know, I think that's a great question. Definitely have seen,

improvements in a number of different areas. The coaching has improved tremendously. So that's one area where it's really gotten better. I think that our top level talent is higher than it was in the past. What I would say is I think there's this, you know, you didn't play as many young players before. And now a lot of young players are getting an opportunity. And, you know, and sometimes they're playing, you know, I think whether they're ready or not. And there is this young influx of players that are in the league that, you know, I think, you know, it will take time to see if they're actually going to make it. But they're getting opportunities where they always have it in the past. Yeah, it feels like obviously with the U-22 initiative, a stated goal, but it also feels like

internally a lot of clubs have made the decision that they need to produce players, whether whether it's to sell them or have them in their first team. Yeah, definitely. And then you have to give them opportunities. And it's no different than what happens in Europe. You know, you see, you know, Champions the game, Marshall's winning 3-0, and they put on a 16-year-old to make his debut, right? They understand they, like, did he earn that debut, right?

Or is it because of the scoreline and they want to give him an opportunity and they want to raise his market value? So I understand how, you know, how it all works. It is going to be a special year in Major League Soccer. I said there's a lot of differences with the way you're operating in Chicago, maybe in the past one it feels like coming is the stadium as someone working in the club seeing the renderings hearing the conversation how big of a goal is that for the team and how inspiring is it to to potentially be the ones to debut in there you know one of the reasons why um i was

really excited about this opportunity was because of our owner and how bullish he is on building something impactful for the city of chicago and um you know i didn't sign up with with the idea that the stadium would come this soon. And this is something that happened after I signed up. But, you know, I'm not surprised. I'm not surprised because of Joe's commitment to this club and his bullishness on soccer in Chicago and in the United States. And I think it's a huge accomplishment for the club. You know, the president, Dave Baldwin, has been working really hard with the city to get this fast-tracked. And, you know, it's going to be an absolutely incredible stadium. You know, our training ground, I don't know if you've seen it at all, is already,

you know, off the charts, incredible. And then to add a stadium that's about a mile and a half, two miles away from the training ground, you know, right in the city of Chicago is, you know, unbelievable. All right. I started you looking back at 25. Let's look forward to 2026. What are you most excited for in this year? The World Cup. That's a good one. I mean, we're hosting the World Cup. Could you believe it? You know, it's going to be an absolute. amazing, I think, experience, an amazing opportunity for Americans to see what the world game is on our home soil. I remember in 1994 the impact it had and really excited for the impact now in 2026. Besides that, you know, just, you know, excited to see the growth, the growth of all

teams, you know, I think it's, you know, our obligation to keep things moving, keep things progressing, keep things improving, and excited to see how other teams go about that and how we go about that for next season. You obviously put blood, sweat, and tears into the national team. What does it feel like to watch a lot of the young players whose debuts you gave and the system you built elevate to the level it has? And as you see the draw, thinking about the players you've worked with for so long, being on the field in these big moments. You know, the one thing I know about the World Cup is unique experience. And to think about, you know, us potentially, we went into 2022 with one player that had World Cup experience. And now to think about, you know, going into this

next World Cup with potentially, you know, 18 players that have World Cup experience and in the prime of their careers. And, you know, some of them playing some of the best soccer of their lives. When you look at Christian Pulisic, you know, he's been on fire. Wesley McKinney's been doing a great job. you know and all the other players Chris Richards right who's taking the next step you know he got injured before the last World Cup he wasn't able to take part so to think about um having our players in their prime to have them with this World Cup experience um and then to have some some young players that are knocking on the door and really pushing are really hungry you know to me it's an exciting opportunity for the for the US team uh on the MLS side you last year where you finished

two years ago, you would have been fourth in the Eastern Conference. It was a gauntlet in the East. You said progressing things. It feels like the East is accelerating. What do you make of the teams around you and how good they are? I love it. I mean, I think that, you know, you look at the schedule and you're like, all right, when are we getting to get an easy game?

And it's just not coming. But having said that, you know, it's, you know, again, if you put the, if you work with a process that it's really about the game in front of you, you know, you get results when you don't think you're going to get results. You know, who thought we were going to go down and beat Miami 5'3 in Miami to clinch playoffs? You know what I mean? Like, but you have to be focused. You have to be, you know, working hard.

And you need to bring that intensity each and every game. Well, we can't wait to see the team back out there once again next season. We appreciate you taking the time to chat with us and we look forward to doing it again. You bet. Thank you.