NYCFC saw off cross-town rivals Red Bull New York 3-1 in the U.S. Open Cup Round of 16 tie at Sports Illustrated Stadium on Wednesday night.
Despite both teams’ defensive struggles recently, both attempted to attack every opportunity they got, giving the 9,000-plus in attendance on Wednesday evening a good show.
“The defensive part of the game was a little worrying at times, but once we’re good on the ball, it was solid, and we have a good defensive organization,” NYCFC head coach Pascal Jansen said. “It’s hard to score goals against us. And if you play the way we do, especially in the second half, we should have taken advantage of four moments that we created.”
Set-pieces were the Red Bulls’ undoing on the night as the Boys in Blue scored their three goals from unlikely sources through corners. Maxi Moralez assisted all three, becoming the seventh player to assist three times in a single match since 1995.
For the opener, Kai Trewin beat Adri Mehmeti and Matty Dos Santos to a Maxi Moralez cross, nodding home the ball in the 9th minute to score his first goal for NYCFC.
Julian Hall equalized not five minutes after, from an RBNY counterattack. Ronald Donkor picked out Cade Cowell with a brilliant pass on the right wing, and the winger slid the ball in the middle. Hall beat Thiago Martins for pace on his way towards the goal and was able to reach the ball and score before the Brazilian defender.
The teenager tapped the ball in and cupped his ears towards the NYCFC supporters’ section in celebration.
“We tried to bring some life back into the game after that,” Hall said. “Unfortunately, the result didn’t hold…We thought we had a good first half — we were all over the pitch, but it didn’t transpire in the second half.”
Then, Raul Gustavo rose to head home in the 39th minute to restore City’s lead from their fifth corner of the match. He out-muscled Donkor in the box to create space for himself and headed the ball in with little celebration afterward.
“From a physical profile standpoint, it’s an area where, on some nights, we’re going to be really challenged,” RBNY head coach Michael Bradley said. “We don’t have a team full of guys that are 6-2, 6-3 right down the line, that’s just reality. We have to continue to find the right ways to work at that part of the game.”
Both sides had their spells of momentum, but RBNY fashioned out the more dangerous of chances in the first half. They forced Matt Freese into action three times and had more possession than their Blue counterparts — a hard thing to accomplish against Jansen’s possession-heavy team.
After the break, it was all NYCFC. They had two chances within 10 minutes of the restart and took advantage of RBNY’s poor set-piece defending once again to double their lead in the 57th minute. Donkor failed to track Thiago Martins from the back post, and the captain beat Dylan Nealis to the header to score NYCFC’s third.
Malachi Jones made his first start for NYCFC since June 2024 against Orlando City and struggled to make an impression on the match.
“I’m very excited by what I’ve seen in the first half,” Jansen said of Jones. “Today, in such a big game as this, to see Malachi with the qualities that he has and can bring to the game, it was phenomenal to see. He was so happy…but he was only allowed to play 45 minutes. This looks promising.”
He was taken off after the break for Talles Magno on the left wing.
It offered the Boys in Blue more flexibility and unpredictability in attack. Both Nicolás Fernández Mercau and Magno would try to create from deep and would play balls in behind to the pacier Agustin Ojeda. The Red Bulls struggled to clear their lines in each of them and give NYCFC’s attackers a second bite at McCarthy’s goal.
Bradley made a triple substitution 10 minutes after NYCFC’s third goal to change the game. Captain Emil Forsberg was taken off for Neheun Benedetti, who put up one assist against the Pittsburgh Riverhounds in the previous round of the Cup.
But it didn’t change much for the Red Bulls, even when Eric Maxim-Chuopo Moting came on for Hall towards the end of the half. NYCFC were well organized in condensing the pitch to the midfield and forcing turnovers from that space to stifle RBNY. The Red Bulls had one shot on target all second half long — Nealis forcing a save out of Freese in the third minute of injury time.
“In certain moments, the way that we play and attack, it still means that we’re getting into the box and getting into really good spots and then not always getting the shot off,” Bradley said.
The result means NYCFC beat their cross-town rivals in the U.S. Open Cup on its fourth attempt, and won a Hudson River Derby knockout match for the first time in club history.
By the 75th minute, the NYCFC supporters’ section was ‘ole’-ing every pass their team made, and singing the brisk April night away.
“Being part of this historic moment is a good thing,” Jansen said. “I hope we beat them many more times at home, but also here. It’s a huge moment for the team to feel the emotion of a win again, and hopefully it will help us get back on our feet in [the league].”
