Chicago Fire’s Chris Brady Eyes Spot on USMNT Roster for 2026 FIFA World Cup

Chris Brady isn’t your average 22-year-old American athlete.

If the Chicago Fire’s Homegrown goalkeeper, who has been the club’s full-time starter in goal since he was 18 in 2023, were the average person in his age bracket, he would be focused on graduating college this month and entering the workforce.

Instead, the Naperville native is in the midst of the most important run of his professional career, all of which is leading up to hopefully earning a spot on the United States Men’s National Team for the upcoming FIFA Men’s World Cup in the United States, Canada, and Mexico.

Brady put himself in a position to be in contention for the USMNT’s third goalkeeper spot under head coach Mauricio Pochettino throughout his first three seasons as a full-time starter in Major League Soccer, but he has elevated his game to new heights in 2026.

Brady, who made his professional debut as a 16-year-old for USL League One side Forward Madison in 2020 before becoming the Chicago Fire II starter in 2022, is having the time of his life in 2026 as the Chicago Fire are playing with more quality than they have throughout his young career. The Fire will enter the World Cup break no lower than fourth in the Eastern Conference and the club is finally starting to look like a group that should compete at the top of MLS when the playoffs begin in the fall.

The club did a lot to get back on track last week with wins on the road over D.C United and CF Montréal, and Brady was at the center of the proceedings, particularly late at Stade Saputo as Montréal scrambled to find a result at home. While Brady did well late to secure three points for his side in Canada, it was the save he made before halftime with his side up a goal that boosted his confidence entering that tough final 45-minute stretch.

Montréal forward Wikelman Carmona won his side a free kick 20 yards from goal in first half stoppage time, and the former RBNY winger took the shot on himself from the set-piece, forcing Brady to make a sprawling save to deny the rocketed shot just before the break. That wasn’t the first time that Brady has made a crucial save from a set-piece shot in 2026; his save on Hany Mukhtar’s free kick in the Fire’s win over Nashville SC earlier this season may be the best one of his short career. The ability to make those saves is a product of the game slowing down for the Chicago Fire’s Homegrown keeper in 2026.

“I was thinking, it’s right before half, I had a feeling he wasn’t going to try and finesse it over the wall, but I thought he was going to put way more bend on the effort,” Brady told On Tap Sports Net’s Joe Chatz days before the USMNT’s World Cup roster is announced.

“My mentality when facing a direct free kick, for example, is just like wherever I see the ball move initially, my feet need to go first, and then the hands need to follow. Everything needs to be in a good set shape where my whole body is moving in one linear line and when I do that, I’m able to make explosive saves…”

Brady’s confidence defending set-pieces started before Berhalter took over, but that’s since been elevated by the culture his boss has established in Chicago’s locker room.

“Right before Gregg came, we were conceding a lot of goals, but in games when we were facing direct set pieces, I felt like that was the one thing that I could be fully in control of—how I can affect a set piece, that was where I felt like I could have my biggest impact.”

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Gregg Berhalter was hired as the Chicago Fire’s director of football and head coach ahead of the 2025 MLS season, and the former USMNT boss has consistently challenged Brady to elevate his play. Berhalter’s system relies on the goalkeeper to be comfortable with the ball at their feet as that provides them with an extra man in the build-up, which was not something Brady was comfortable doing before his new boss arrived.

Learning how to be better with the ball at his feet has remained a priority for Brady under Berhalter, who he says helped everyone in Chicago by creating clear expectations for a squad that desperately needed them before his arrival.

What that style of play has also done is make this Chicago Fire side a far more confident group than they’ve been in the last decade.

“Where I think Gregg has played a really big role is everything’s so clear. There’s a massive sense of clarity of what’s expected from us, the pressure that we’re faced with each week, everything is right there for the taking and we just have to do what we know.

“I think the state of confidence that you’ve seen in me, I think you would also see in a lot of the other guys on the team because if you ask that question ‘are these guys having fun?’ I think they’d say yeah too because, one, winning is fun, success is fun and getting points every weekend is fun. But, two, when we do lose games or tie games and drop points, we know it comes with easy fixes. In our minds, it’s not like these teams beat us badly. We could’ve beaten them. It’s just little fixes, little changes that we know we’re capable of making.

“So because of that, there’s a ton less pressure on us and it’s not like, ‘are we a good team or a bad team?’ We just have our standard.”

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Brady and the Chicago Fire received a boost when the club signed center back Mbezekeli Mbokazi in the winter, and the two are looking to each make their first World Cup roster in the coming days. The 20-year-old South African center back has dazzled in his short time in MLS and was named in MLS’s Team of Matchday 14 starting eleven alongside Brady. It’s clear that the young defender has elevated the defensive group while providing some levity in the process.

Chicago had a moment to take a breath in the first half last weekend against CF Montréal, and that’s when Mbokazi, who has been working hard on his English since moving to Chicago, shocked his goalkeeper by providing some in-game feedback.

“This is the first time he’s ever pieced together a sentence to me or I think to anybody else in the back line. He said, ‘Chris, you know, sometimes when the back line’s sliding and they play a ball down into the corner with Jack, I don’t want to go with Jack because they’ve got two guys pinning me and Rado.’ And I’m sitting there like, ‘oh my god.’ I was stunned, I was shocked. I agreed, I was like, ‘yeah, of course, of course. Let me, let me go tell Jack,’ and it was like this moment of ‘oh my god, he knows how to speak English and he knows how to speak well.’

Little surprises like that are really funny because he’s been a rock; you know what you get, but sometimes you still get a little moment where he does something and you can say ‘wow, that’s really cool.’”

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Chris Brady still sees himself as just another kid from Naperville, not a 22-year-old trying to make it to the biggest stage in soccer for the first time. His time off is largely spent with family, friends, and loved ones, which is no different than before he became someone competing for a World Cup spot.

Many would be overwhelmed by the attention, but the experience has been humbling and encouraging for Brady, particularly as he has become more confident in himself on and off the pitch.

“I never put a lot of stock in the growth of my image; I just think I’m just some goalkeeper, some kid. It’s not something I can ignore, and I do my best to try and embrace it as best I can, making time for every fan, every person that enjoys watching me play, watching us play. Those people give us a purpose.

“So I like to embrace it, but it doesn’t make me super nervous or anything, and it doesn’t make me feel any type of way other than just feeling humble about what I do.”

When expectations arrive, nerves typically follow. That is the product of preparation and excitement for the task ahead while also being an established piece in goal for his side.

“When I go into games, I have a feeling of a little anxiety, like an eagerness to get out on the field and play. I don’t attribute that to nerves.”

As he reflected on what still makes him nervous, Brady took a moment before speaking toward a feeling that can be felt by anyone consumed by their profession. The question of whether one is doing the most with their life is a common source of existential concern, but it’s one part of Brady’s life that he doesn’t have the answer for at only 22 years old.

“Probably this one thought of life, am I living life enough? I know that’s like an odd thing to get nervous about, but I do think about that all the time. So much of my life has been consumed by soccer, and it’s what I owe everything to. But part of me thinks, like, we’re all human, and we have one life to live.

“It’s important that we live it as best we can, do the most we can, try new things.”

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A spot on the United States Men’s National Team’s roster for the 2026 FIFA World Cup would be a dream come true for Chris Brady. He wants to don the red, white, and blue when the USMNT begins their World Cup campaign on June 12 against Paraguay in Inglewood, California.

With six clean sheets in 2026 (the same he totaled in 2025), increased quality of play, and establishing trust with the current USMNT staff over the last few international windows, Brady believes he has done enough to earn a spot on Pochettino’s World Cup roster.

“I mean, I hope so. The decision is up to fate and the coaching staff, so we’ll find out soon.”

Regardless of the outcome, Brady is at peace with how he’s performed with the USMNT staff watching from a distance with an encouraging eye.

“I think so because I’ve been able to grow through applying the concepts that I’ve taken from the new coaching staff when Gregg came in with [Chicago Fire goalkeeper coach] Zach [Thornton] and [Chicago Fire assistant goalkeeper coach] Joe [Bendik] in our goalkeeper core. When I was with the national team, I was able to apply the concepts I’ve learned from [USMNT goalkeeper coach] Toni [Jimenez] and the goalkeeping core there to what I do every weekend. So, from my perspective, I’ve been able to apply those concepts really well, and I think that to me shows growth over time.”