New York City FC can't solve Luis Barraza, settle for 0-0 at DC

Sometimes a former player's revenge game comes back to bite you, and that happened to New York City FC on Matchday 13.

Longtime New York City goalkeeper Luis Barraza denied his former teammates repeatedly and emphatically, making five saves to earn his DC United a 0-0 draw at Audi Field.

The visiting team dominated in the nation's capital if you go by the number of shots New York City attempted and put on target, but a goal simply refused to arrive for a third straight match across all competitions. Though this draw represented an improvement on the back-to-back losses to the Pittsburgh Riverhounds SC and CF Montréal, it still goes down as a frustrating result for New York City.

DC United's star striker Christian Benteke left the match injured in the 20th minute and DC looked bereft of ways to threaten New York City without him. It was an unfortunate way for the game to change – Benteke walked with a significant limp while exiting the field with the rest of his DC teammates, but ultimately, the opportunity presented by his departure was not seized upon by NYCFC.

DC had a few late chances to steal all three points against the run of play, but Matt Freese made two key saves to ensure his team walked out with one point they wished was really three.

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Hudson River BlueOliver Strand

No way through

The first half was begging for an opener to be scored, and New York City peppered the DC United goal with shots, but the finish was never there. Alonso Martínez banged a shot off the woodwork in the 11th minute after some nifty footwork to weave through the DC defense and after a nice link-up with Julián Fernández, who played the Costa Rican striker in on Barraza's goal.

Barraza stopped two other Martínez shots in the first half and eventually denied him a third time in the second half. Martínez has been trying and trying to get back into the goals, but his last three appearances – against Cincinnati, Montréal, and now DC – have been frustrating goalless performances for the usually accurate and efficient finisher.

It wasn't just Martínez, though, as both Andrés Perea and Jonny Shore had point-blank shots stopped by Barraza accounting for his two other saves, while Fernández wasted a glorious scoring opportunity by putting a shot wide of the target while clear in on Barraza during first-half stoppage time.

The opportunities to score were more numerous in DC, with Fernández enjoying a strong night as a creator while notching six chances created. Still, none of Fernández, Martínez, or Hannes Wolf looked fully in sync or up to actually scoring when the ball came their way in dangerous positions.

Fluid formation, fluid lineup

Pascal Jansen started Birk Risa in something like the role of a traditional left-back, but Risa didn't spend all of his 72 minutes hugging the sideline and providing width. Jansen had his team change its shape depending on the game state, with Risa occasionally forming a back-three with Thiago Martins and Tayvon Gray while Justin Haak, usually staying at home at left-center-back, advanced into the midfield to link up with Jonny Shore, Andrés Perea, and Maxi Moralez.

Jansen says he wants to overload teams in the central midfield, and Risa's comfort playing as both a true center-back but also shifting to function as a fullback when needed allowed Jansen to leverage Justin Haak's comfort in shifting between midfield and defense.

The formation changed and so, too, did the New York City personnel, as Jansen seemed to want to manage the minutes of some of his most important players heading into this weekend's much-anticipated first Hudson River Derby of 2025.

Maxi Moralez only played 45 minutes, replaced at halftime by the freshly-arrived Aiden O'Neill. O'Neill, not Andrés Perea, functioned as the most advanced central midfielder for some of the second half in DC before he eventually dropped deeper into a double-pivot alongside Perea. That change occurred once 17-year-old attacking midfielder Máximo Carrizo entered as a substitute.

Both O'Neill and Carrizo made their second-ever appearances for New York City FC in this 0-0 at Audi Field, though neither player – nor Agustín Ojeda, Nico Cavallo, or Mitja Ilenič – could break the team's season-long streak of having zero goals scored by a substitute entering off the bench.

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Hudson River BlueMatthew Mangam

Attention turns to the derby

The New York City attack continued to sputter in Washington, DC, but one player who heads into this rivalry match against the Red Bulls at Citi Field with all sorts of positive momentum on his side: Matt Freese.

The goalkeeper had very little to do for much of the night at Audi Field but he was once again up to the task when called upon to make match-saving stops, doing it twice, first in the 66th minute and then again in the 79th minute. Conceding at all to DC would have been a huge setback for New York City given that Benteke was out of action for the bulk of the game and given how much New York City dominated the flow of the proceedings, but Freese made sure the sheet stayed clean.

The margin of error for this New York City team might be bordering on microscopic right now. They can't seem to find ways to score goals, so any hopes for positive results rest on the hands and feet of Freese. He's gotten lots of recent help at the back from players like Thiago Martins and Justin Haak, but New York City will need to see The Iceman hold up to this high level if they're going to inflict any damage on their cross-river rivals.