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When Xherdan Shaqiri signed for Chicago Fire in 2022, he was supposed to be a transformational signing.
After all, he was the highest-paid player in Major League Soccer at the time, guaranteed to earn at least $8.15 million (£6.4 million at today’s rates) a year. Two play-off appearances since 2010 are not ideal; terrible, in fact. The Fire were looking for the man who won the league title in the first six seasons of his career, with Basel in Switzerland and then Bayern Munich in Germany, to raise them to the level reached in the 2000s.
It didn’t really happen that way.
Shaqiri scored a few goals but was maddeningly inconsistent. This season, he has two appearances in 12 and has not been a certain starter. Is it a coincidence that his club has drawn two and won two since joining the Swiss team for the European Championship, having won only two of the matches he has played? Maybe. But they were clearly not damaged by his absence.
Yet some players may simply be much more suited to international football.
Shaqiri was a surprise selection for Switzerland’s second Euro 2024 match against Scotland, a 1-1 draw on Wednesday. It was Swiss coach Murat Yakin’s second big decision in two matches: he selected, almost out of nowhere, Kwadwo Duah for the opener against Hungary and was rewarded with a goal after just 12 minutes.
GO FURTHER
The briefing: Scotland 1 Switzerland – Shaqiri’s daze, confusion in the own goal, Tierney’s agony
With Duah having impressed so much, it was equally surprising that Shaqiri replaced him for the Scotland game. But once again, Yakin was rewarded. And what is really gratifying for the coach, who was under pressure before the tournament, is that neither man could have scored the other’s goal.
Duah used his pace to slip behind the Hungarian defense and find the net on Saturday, but that wasn’t the case with Shaqiri, whose movement these days is… a little more selective. But there was also no chance that Duah would have scored the goal that Shaqiri did, sending the ball into the top corner after Scotland winger Anthony Ralston presented him with the ball about 25 yards from goal.
(Bradley Collyer/PA Images via Getty Images)
And to be fair to Duah, it wasn’t just him.
“I don’t know how many other players could have scored this goal,” Yakin said after the match. “But he has so much confidence and ability that he was able to pull it off.”
His Scottish counterpart, Steve Clarke, was of the same opinion. “If this chance goes to another player from the Swiss team, it is not a goal,” he said. “So that tells you what I think of Shaqiri. When he rolled towards Shaqiri, he was destined for the back of the net. You don’t give the best players that kind of chance.
Shaqiri was selected as a false nine and spent most of his time on the pitch dropping deep to create space for the more mobile Swiss players to move into, but in reality he would not have been in able to score the goal if he had not been present. the center forward position.
And standing is the key word. He doesn’t move much these days, at least not dynamically. But you don’t really need to go very far if you can hit strikes as smoothly as that.
It wasn’t just a brilliant goal: it was a historic goal. Shaqiri is one of seven Major League Soccer players at Euro 2024 (if you count Olivier Giroud, who has yet to play a game for LAFC), but when that ball passed just l Inside the post against Scotland, Shaqiri became the first MLS player to score in a European Championship match. In fact, he is the first player from a North American or South American club to score in the great European jamboree.
That wasn’t all. Shaqiri laughed rather sheepishly after the match when it was pointed out that he was part of a select club of four to have scored in three Euros and three World Cups. (Miroslav Klose, Jurgen Klinsmann and Cristiano Ronaldo are the others. Not bad company.)
Does this tell us anything about MLS? It’s tempting to ascribe additional meaning to a moment like that. One in the eye of those who write off MLS, look at the quality that exists there.
That may be true, but it could also be that some players are simply more comfortable with their national team. Which isn’t really a surprise: Shaqiri made his international debut in 2010, and it was his 124th cap and 32nd goal. Only Granit Xhaka played more. Only three players have scored more.
He looks so much more comfortable in a Swiss shirt. It’s like a cozy blanket, designed by Puma. “We are still good collectively,” he said after the match. “Everyone reaches their highest level of performance. »
Shaqiri scores for Switzerland (Jan Fromme/firo sportphoto/Getty Images)
A harsh assessment of his club career is that Shaqiri hasn’t really been a relevant player since 2018, the last time he was close to a Liverpool regular. Since then, he has had a brief, unsuccessful stint in Lyon in France, before moving to Chicago in 2022.
But he is always there for the Swiss, even if he doesn’t always start. His role in the team was the subject of much debate before this match and before the tournament, and some doubted whether he should have been in Germany.
There were certainly many others ahead of him in the hierarchy. Duah, for starters. Zeki Amdouni another. Breel Embolo, despite returning from a knee injury that kept him out for most of last season with Monaco, was probably a better bet to start. It was as if, in Yakin’s 3-4-3 system, there was no room for him: not a natural center forward, not fast enough to play on the wings, not reliable enough to play at Midfielder.
But Yakin knows something is going on between Shaqiri and Switzerland. Especially during international tournaments.
“I hope so,” Shaqiri replied when asked if he would still be around to score at the 2026 World Cup in the United States, Canada and Mexico. “But that’s a far cry from thinking about it, my friend. I’m just looking forward to the next game.
And with that, he was gone. But as long as he wears a Swiss shirt, he will come back.
(Top photo: Bradley Collyer/PA Images via Getty Images)