At Patrick Vieira’s introductory press conference as New York City FC coach in January, he spoke about developing a team that would represent New York City in the right way.
“New York is really lively,” he said at the time. “It is full of energy in this city and I would like my team to reflect what New York is all about. So I will ask my players, I would want my team to be full of energy, to be lively and to develop a really positive attitude.”
With eight games left in the regular season, Vieira believes NYCFC has accomplished that goal.
“I think when we go on the field, we try to represent the city with the way we play because we play with personality, we play with taking risks and we have a clear identity and philosophy of the way we want to play,” Vieira said. “We try to reflect what’s going on in the city.”
New York City FC heads into the home stretch first place in the Eastern Conference, unbeaten in their last four with wins over the Colorado Rapids and LA Galaxy on their resume.
The improvement from early March to late August is evident.
“I think we are a completely different team from the first game we played to the last game we played against LA,” Vieira said. “We’re getting stronger, we are a better team now because credit to the players, they work really hard. As a team, we’re seeing the work we are doing, the shifts we’re doing in training every day, we are more solid as a team.”
NYCFC not only sits atop the East, but they are also currently third in the Supporters Shield race, four points off the pace set by FC Dallas.
But that doesn’t mean the work ends.
“I think we’re hitting on all cylinders, but we still have a lot of work to do,” fullback RJ Allen said. “I can improve and as a collective group we can improve. We’re just going to keep pushing forward and we look forward to these last eight games. We need to finish strong and obviously we still want to finish top of the table and earn the right to stay there.”
