New York City FC head coach Jason Kreis shared some thoughts on the Frank Lampard saga after his team’s 2-0 preseason victory over Scottish side St. Mirren in Manchester on Tuesday night, telling reporters that he hopes “everybody can forgive and forget” the offseason drama surrounding the Designated Player by the time he arrives in New York in July.
NYCFC, parent club Manchester City and Lampard decided last month that the English midfielder would stay with Man City until the conclusion of the English Premier League season in May. That decision angered some of the expansion club’s fans, who had been led to believe that Lampard would be with the team in time for their first-ever MLS match at Orlando City SC on March 8 (5 pm ET, ESPN2).
Kreis said Tuesday that he believes that NYCFC supporters will eventually receive Lampard well when he arrives in MLS, and he hopes that the expansion club’s fans will embrace the entire team over any one individual.
Lampard met with his future NYCFC teammates on Monday night, reportedly enjoying dinner with them at the team hotel in Manchester. He was not in attendance for Tuesday’s match against St. Mirren, as he was with Man City at a hotel ahead of their Wednesday match against US international Geoff Cameron and Stoke City.
“I think at the end of it all when everybody is calmed down and settled down a little bit that everybody can forgive and forget,” Kreis said.
“It’s my dream, really, that at some point very quickly the fans of NYC aren’t talking about the individual players. I’m hopeful they understand that this is about a team, it isn’t about David Villa or Frank Lampard or Jason Kreis. This is about a squad and a club and what we can do for the community.”
NYCFC’s other DP, club captain David Villa, also weighed in on the Lampard situation, speaking with reporters about his eventual teammate after scoring the first goal in Tuesday’s match.
“It would have been great that he was here now, but for City the best thing is for him to stay in Manchester,” Villa said. “We are only going to be focused to work hard so that when he joins in July, we can be a team that is really good and he can only improve us.”
In addition to addressing the circumstances surrounding Lampard, Kreis also spoke about the possibility of adding Manchester City players on loan for the 2015 season. NYCFC will be allowed to take up to four players on loan from the EPL side this year. One potential loan candidate appears to be Man City Elite Development Squad defender Shay Facey, who trained with NYCFC in Jacksonville, Florida and started for Kreis on Tuesday night.
“It’s something we’re interested in,” Kreis said when asked about the possibility of taking players on loan. “Individually I have a lot of interest in bringing some Man City players over on loan because I think it would be a cool thing. It would be great for a young coach like myself to be involved with the development of a young Manchester City talent. There are some player who we have looked at it but it needs to be a good fit. We won’t do it just to do it. Any player who we do loan needs to bring something to our team.”
