No Matt Freese and Alonso Martínez, no problem

Things look to be trending in the right direction for New York City FC after that emphatic 4-0 win over Atlanta United, a result Pascal Jansen's team earned with four regular members of the Starting XI still missing due to ongoing national team duty. Episode 43 begins with a breakdown of that dominant display by NYCFC in the Ronny Deila Derby, one made more impressive due to it occurring without leading goalscorer Alonso Martínez at striker, nor with the always reliable Matt Freese in goal. Hosts John Baney and Mark Radigan and producer Andrew Leigh have wondered all season where the non-Martínez goals would come from, and the win over Atlanta added to a growing body of evidence that the team's next best option in attack might be Hannes Wolf, who now leads the team in goal contributions and who could be rounding into the best form of his MLS career to date. Our Atlanta win wrap-up also includes some more talk about Pascal Jansen's tactical creativity and flexibility, given his defensive line against Atlanta included four players you'd consider center-backs, and given that, on top of the international absentees, Jansen was also missing injured midfielder Keaton Parks. The New York City coach has been pushing all the right buttons, and he might need to keep doing it, because following a break, we run through updates on how NYCFC's remaining international call-ups are faring, namely the two Gold Cup participants, Martínez with Costa Rica and Freese with the United States, plus Mitja Ilenič at the UEFA U21 Euros with Slovenia's U21s. Finally, we wrap up this episode by discussing the new soccer circus that came to town in recent days: The FIFA Club World Cup. Do your hosts have growing cases of Club World Cup Fever, or is this whole thing one big mess that we'd rather not get involved with? Listen as we dive into some of the many interesting, sometimes perplexing, sometimes infuriating angles of the Club World Cup, especially as it pertains to the three participating MLS teams and the matches taking place in our backyard at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey. Check out this latest episode and then find more of our coverage by following Hudson River Blue on Bluesky, Instagram, and Threads, and by reading all our work at HudsonRiverBlue.com. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.