Meet NYCFC: As the Queens soccer team’s season ends, many eye the future
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As NYCFC fought for a playoff spot over the weekend, the team plots plans for a new stadium. Eagle photo by Ryan Schwach
By Ryan Schwach
On the pitch on Saturday night in Flushing, it was a must win of must wins for New York City Football Club. In order to make Major League Soccer’s playoffs, NYCFC, the Big Apple’s only championship-winning franchise in the last decade, needed a win against the Chicago Fire. They also needed two other matches unfolding elsewhere in the league to go in their favor in order to advance.
Regardless of what happened on the pitch itself, its boundaries drawn into Citi Field’s baseball diamond, NYCFC’s regular season was coming to a close, and its fans and management, though hoping for a playoff berth, were also looking toward the future of the team – and their new, first permanent home, which is planned to be built in Queens.
Last week, the club officially began the city’s process for getting its planned 25,000-seat soccer stadium in Willets Point approved – the team hopes to open the stadium to fans in 2027. It kicks off the beginning of a process where NYCFC needs to receive approval from the local community board, the borough president and the City Council before a shovel can go in the ground. Like the game unfolding on the pitch on Saturday night, the team needs several outside factors to go their way in order to get the outcome they want.
Getting the project approved and built would mark the beginning of a new era for the team, which was founded in 2013 and has been on the hunt for a home since then. Though the work predates the tenure of president and CEO of the team, Brad Sims, who spoke to the Eagle just before kickoff on Saturday, he said he was “excited” by the “incredible project.”
“It's obviously a long time coming,” Sims said. “We've been working on this for 10-plus years, trying to find a true home for NYCFC.”
Since NYCFC’s first matches in 2015, they have played regular season home games in four different arenas in three different states. Most of their games, however, have been played at one of the city’s two Major League Baseball stadiums – Yankee Stadium or Citi Field.
“We couldn't be more pleased that we're landing in Queens,” said Sims. “This is a perfect spot for this project, perfect spot for a football stadium, because this is the world's game in the world’s city, and this is the World’s Borough.”
NYCFC has had a tumultuous decade-long existence, coming as a new project from the City Football Group, an English-based sporting company founded by powerful royals and politicians in the United Arab Emirates in 2013. NYCFC was the company's first new team after taking over English Premier League club Manchester City, who since CFG’s takeover have skyrocketed from years of failure to one of the most dominant forces in global football. During its club’s rise, CFG was also accused of breaking several league and international rules in the process. Now, CFG has stake in 12 clubs worldwide, and is priced at more than 1.5 billion Euros.
NYCFC – which is 20 percent owned by Yankee Global Enterprises – on the other hand, had a lack of success in their early years despite help from the likes of once European superstars David Villa, Frank Lampard and Andrea Pirlo.
However, in 2021 NYCFC made it to the mountaintop, winning their first MLS title despite finishing fourth in the Eastern Conference and having the league’s lowest mean attendance.
This season, NYCFC is looking at the playoffs from the outside, and before Saturday had 8 wins, 14 draws and 11 losses.
Sims took over as president and CEO in 2019 after six years as an executive with the NBA’s Cleveland Cavaliers, and has had a large role in overseeing the club’s stadium plans.
“Every time we get a little bit farther into designs and drawings and our work with our partners, Queens Development Group, and every time things get closer to being real, it gets more and more exciting,” he said. “I can't really put it into words, it's something that we've all put so much time and effort and energy resources into.”
The design process is not just about building a stadium itself, it's about figuring out how it sits in the entirety of the Willets Point development project, which includes thousands of units of housing, commercial buildings and community spaces.
“You're not just finding land and throwing a stadium in the middle of something and trying to figure out how to fit – we're able to design the stadium and the district all together so that they all fit,” Sims said. “It feels like part of the neighborhood.”
Brad Sims, president and CEO of NYCFC. Photo via NYCFC
Completing the project will involve leaping a lot of hurdles, which Sims says he is not naive to, He’s sought approval from local electeds before, who, like the teams NYCFC needed to lose on Monday, have their own interests and expectations in mind.
“A lot of the reason why it's taking this long to get to this point is because of all the robust dialogue that we've had with everybody,” said Sims. “But there's a lot more to come. I think over the next seven months, there's going to be challenges.”
“It's naive to say there won't be, but we're looking forward to it,” he added.
In recent weeks, Queens Borough President Donovan Richards threatened to block approval of the stadium in protest of the city’s enforcement of street vendors at Corona Plaza.
“My position was and will continue to be, how are the local residents benefiting from this stadium? How's the city treating the very community that this stadium is going to be placed?” Richards said in a phone call with the Eagle last week.
Richards has suggested including local concessionaires into the stadium, something Sims says has been discussed.
“This is not just simply about coming in and scoring the goal in the stadium, we need to make sure that those goals are being scored for the community,” Richards said.
Queens Community Board 7 has been among the first to get looks at the stadium plans, and want the entire Willets Point development to serve the community as a whole, and also want a new police precinct included in the plans, a request that hasn’t been agreed to.
Renderings of the future NYCFC soccer stadium, which will hold 25,000 fans. Rendering via Joint Venture Developers, Hok Architecture and Economic Development Corporation
Sims says they hope to bring the community into the planning process as much as possible.
“We want to make sure that when people come to our games, they're going to get a taste of Queens, a taste of New York City,” he said. “They're going to know they're in New York City, they're going to know they're in Queens.”
As for specific aspects of the stadium, Sims says there is talks of including a project featuring the history of soccer in New York City, and an expansion of the club’s nonprofit arm which will be headquartered in the new stadium with classroom areas and programming, as well as spaces for community events.
“We have our main city square area, which is 40,000-ish square feet of open space that we will be looking for community usage,” he said. “I think the biggest thing for us is making sure that the stadium is a resource to the community.”
While Sims and the other executives of NYCFC look toward their future, a level down from the executive suites at Citi Field, fans from the Third Rail and Los Templados – NYCFC's supporter groups – chant, wave flags and play drums, trying to help propel their squad into the playoffs.
“I started back about eight years ago,” said Angelo Castellanos, a Queens-raised fan and founder of the Third Rail’s Queens chapter. “If we don’t have supporters, we don’t have anything.”
Castellanos shares a surname with Taty Castellanos, an Argentian national who’s league leading 19-goal season powered NYCFC’s 2021 championship campaign. Castellanos now plays for Lazio in the top league of Italian football.
Angelo calls him his “little brother.”
On Saturday, Castellanos led other fans in chants, and waived a Third Rail–Queens flag. He is also among the fans who the front office have looked towards for advice on where to go with the new Queens stadium.
“I grew up in Flushing Meadows, I played soccer for 25 years in Flushing Meadows…I want more for Flushing Meadows because it's going to be our playground next to our stadium,” he said. “It's not about me, it's about the community.”
Castellanos says the soccer pitch he plays at in the park has been deteriorating and has lost its color – and he wants to see NYCFC help out.
Angelo Castellanos, the founder of the Third Rail Queens chapter. Eagle photo by Ryan Schwach
“I want to make sure they clean, bring the players to clinics, tournaments,” he said, adding that the thought of a stadium in his own town makes him more motivated to be a fan.
Other Queens NYCFC fans cheering on the club on Saturday were looking forward to the stadium and what it could bring to the community, as well as to their own personal enjoyment of the club.
“I'm actually super excited because it will definitely bring a lot more jobs to the area and it’s also going to be very close to home – I take one train stop and I’m here,” said Third Rail member Kevin Quiroz of Jackson Heights, who goes to games at both Citi Field and Yankee Stadium. “I'd rather go to Queens because it's one stop away. I can have more fun, I don't have to drive, I can actually just enjoy the game.”
Quiroz began cheering for NYCFC in 2019 and is excited about the team moving to the borough, particularly because of its large Hispanic, soccer-loving population.
“I think that the Latino community wants to join a supportive group like this, be part of something big,” he said. “Hopefully the stadium will be used for more than just soccer games...and it's able to be used for more than just the soccer field. I want to make sure that there's a lot of Latino community representation in it.”
One thing all of the fans the Eagle spoke with during halftime on Saturday agreed on; a Queens stadium will grow the fan base.
“I'm just so happy that it's in Queens,” said Angel Martinez, a Sunnyside resident who plays drums in the Los Templados fan section. “You could tell right away… Queens has more fans than when we go to the Bronx.”
Perhaps also beneficial is the fact that fans of another Queens team – the New York Mets, who will play just across the street from NYCFC – are practiced in the art of loyalty in the face of disappointment.
Though the Boys in Blue played their part on Saturday, it wasn’t enough to land them a spot in the playoffs.
After several scoring opportunities and big saves from goalkeeper Matt Freese to keep the game tied, NYCFC’s 19-year old Argentinian forward Julian Fernandez nailed home a long-distance strike in the 64th minute to make it a 1-0 match, which is where the score would lie until the final whistle blew.
Fans at the Third Rail and Los Templados fan supporter section cheer on NYCFC against Chicago on Saturday. Eagle Photo by Ryan Schwach
However, Charlotte FC and the Red Bulls had their own plans, and playoff hopes of their own. In games concurrent with the one in Queens, Charlotte beat Inter Miami 1-0, and the Red Bulls beat Nashville FC with a penalty kick at the end of the match to win with the same score, propelling both into the playoffs, but keeping NYCFC out of the postseason.
Regardless of the outcome of the season, the fans in the Third Rail and Los Templados will be back in the future, no matter where the match is played, they said.
