It’s game day: New York City FC host Guatemalan side Comunicaciones FC in the first leg of the Scotiabank CONCACAF Champions League (CCL) Quarterfinals. The second leg will be held in Guatemala City one week from today on Tuesday, March 15, at 8 pm ET.
NYCFC advanced to the Quarterfinals after a comprehensive defeat of Costa Rican side Santos de Guápiles in which City scored six goals and allowed none. Comunicaciones advanced after an impressively scrappy performance against the Colorado Rapids played in a Rocky Mountain snowstorm: Reduced to 10 players, Los Cremas held on to force a penalty shootout which they went on to win.
Match: NYCFC host Comunicaciones FC
Date and Time: Tuesday, March 8, 8 pm ET
Venue: Pratt & Whitney Stadium, East Hartford, CT
Watch: FS1, TUDN
Stream: Foxsports.com, TUDN.com
Listen: The game will be broadcast in both English and Spanish on NYCFC Radio
Today’s match will be played on the synthetic field at Pratt & Whitney Stadium in East Hartford, CT, home to the UConn Huskies. NYCFC is hosting their home leg a 110-mile drive from the Bronx (take I-684 to I-84, avoid New Haven traffic) for the same reasons that the club hosted Costa Rican side Santos de Guápiles at Banc of California Stadium in Los Angeles: Yankee Stadium is not a CONCACAF-approved venue; Citi Field, NYCFC’s second home, is also not CONCACAF-approved; and Red Bulls Arena, NYCFC’s other home-away-from-home, is unavailable.
• Injury report: NYCFC Defender Anton Tinnerholm is out with the Achilles injury he suffered last October. The rest of the squad is available.
• NYCFC is coming off two strong performances in the CCL, and two flat performances in MLS—City hasn’t scored a goal in league play so far this season. While NYCFC’s performance in the 0-0 draw with the Vancouver Whitecaps improved on the 1-0 season-opening loss to LA Galaxy, the team has yet to rediscover the on-field chemistry that carried them to the 2021 MLS Cup.
• Playing a home game in East Hartford might be less-than-ideal, but at least the NYCFC squad are home: City have been on the road since preseason training started in mid-January, spending the last seven weeks living out of suitcases in Florida, Mexico, Costa Rica, California, and British Columbia.
• Comunicaciones will be rested and ready. The 30-time winners of the Liga Nacional de Guatemala had their weekend game be rescheduled so that they could travel to the United States and prepare for the CCL match. Comunicaciones arrived in the area on Saturday, one day before NYCFC. You can read about that and more in the “Bielsa Report: Five things you should know about Comunicaciones FC.”
• The CCL isn’t easy on on MLS teams: Both the Seattle Sounders and CF Montréal lost their two opening matches. Seattle has yet to score a goal in MLS, while Montréal managed one goal against 10-man Philadelphia Union. Only the New England Revolution, which advanced on a forfeit and didn’t have to play in the Round of 16, is doing well with one win and one draw.
Poll
In today’s CCL Quarterfinal leg…
This poll is closed
- 38% Talles Magno will step up, seal the game—his form is getting stronger with every match (6 votes)
- 56% Taty Castellanos will step up, seal the game—he’s the franchise player for a reason (9 votes)
- 6% Thiago will step up, seal the game—time for him to prove why he should be a starter (1 vote)
- 0% Nobody will step up, and the game will slip out of our hands—playing so many matches on short rest is no joke (0 votes)
16 votes total
Update: The starting lineup was posted at 7:07 pm ET
