Chicago Fire will be travelling to Portland in 2012; full schedule due in first week of January?

Back in November, Major League Soccer revealed they are shifting back to an unbalanced schedule for the 2012 season after using a balanced one for the past couple of years. Eastern Conference clubs will play seven of their conference opponents three times each (21 total games) and the remaining two conference opponents twice each (4 games). For Western Conference opponents, Eastern teams like the Fire will play each team once. Five games against the West will be on the road and the other five will be at home.

Tonight, Portland Timbers Merritt Paulson tweeted that there will be no Chicago away in 2012 so of course this means Timber's Army won't be coming to Chicago until 2013 and the Fire will be going to Portland next year.

@pdxbarrett no chi away in 2012. No more sched clues. Out 1st week in jan and hopefully much sooner than that next time

It's a schedule situation we knew was coming with the Eastern/Western unbalanced schedule but a shame to read it in print nevertheless. Chicago Fire team writer Jeff Crandall highlighted the alliance Timbers Army and Section 8 Chicago share in an article this past August.

On the plus side, Paulson said the MLS schedule is going to be out in the first week of January and hopefully earlier in the future? This would be a huge improvement. I won't hold my breath though.