Football Season Guide

New York City FC enjoyed a near perfect regular season under coach Patrick Vieira's first campaign in charge of the club as they achieved their minimum expectation of making it to the playoffs. New York overcame a shaky start under Vieira to quickly emerge as serious challengers to New York Red Bulls for the top spot in the Eastern Conference though a dip in form in the final weeks of the season meant that they finished in second place, three points behind their city rivals. Their playoffs campaign though came to a premature end as they stumbled at the first hurdle itself, suffering a heavy 0-7 aggregate defeat to Toronto FC in the Conference semifinals and improving on that finish will be the target for Vieira in his second season. Vieira had managed to find a system that allowed both of New York's Designated Players Andrea Pirlo and Frank Lampard to influence the game from the midfield while David Villa continued his goal scoring exploits by ending the season with 22 goals from 32 games. There has been a pretty decent turnover in players during the off-season with Lampard, Andoni Iraola and Mehdi Ballouchy all retiring from the game while Josh Saunders, Jefferson Mena, Jason Hernandez, Federico Bravo, Tony Taylor and Stiven Mendoza have also left the club. They have boosted their midfield options by signing Alexander Ring and Maximiliano Moralez from Kaiserslautern and Club Leon respectively and the duo could well start in front of Andrea Pirlo when the new campaign kicks off. Sean Johnson has been brought in to replace Saunders as the first choice keeper while the defense will have a familiar feel for the fans with Vieira likely to stick with the tried and tested combination of Maxime Chanot and Frederic Brillant with RJ Allen and Ronald Matarrita playing on either flank. Jack Harrison and Thomas McNamara were breakout players for New York last season and the duo could well be the first choice players to support Villa in the attack. New York should have no trouble booking a place in the playoffs once again this season while anything more will depend on how quickly the host of new signings, especially the foreign recruits, settle down and adapt to the league.