Pascal Jansen expressed his desire to create a winning culture at New York City FC, ahead of their first match of the 2026 campaign against the Los Angeles Galaxy.
After finishing fifth in the Eastern Conference standings last year, NYCFC defeated Charlotte FC over three games in the first round to continue their postseason.
NYCFC then defeated the Philadelphia Union 1-0 in the semi-finals, before losing 5-1 to Inter Miami in the final, with Tadeo Allende scoring a sensational hat-trick for the Herons, who went on to win the MLS Cup.
Although NYCFC received rave reviews for their performances in 2025, Jansen, who is preparing for his second full season in charge, wants more from his team.
“To put it simply: we did a decent job last season, but we want more,” said Jansen. “We want to be successful, which means we have to do better than last season.
“The first step has been taken. We reached the Conference finals, which was a good achievement, but in the end we didn’t win anything.
“So we strive to create a winning culture, and that means you have to be able to win more games and to do that you have to be more consistent.”
We start the season in the west pic.twitter.com/opaPZLsmsd
— New York City FC (@newyorkcityfc) February 19, 2026
The Galaxy, meanwhile, had a year to forget, finishing 14th in the Western Conference just 12 months after winning their sixth MLS Cup.
Greg Vanney’s side have already started the 2026 season, starting their CONCACAF Champions Cup campaign with a disappointing 1-1 draw against Sporting San Miguelito.
It was a match they dominated, with an expected goals (xG) total of 2.08 from 18 shots, compared to their opponents’ 0.32 from five goal attempts.
And after the match at Estadio Universitario, Vanney admitted his team still has a lot of room to improve before welcoming NYCFC to Los Angeles.
“We didn’t take advantage of the situations we created, and they obviously started to lower the numbers and try to block more cases,” Vanney said.
“And then I felt like we stagnated and stopped moving, exchanging with each other and taking actions that would create collaborative movements, third-party actions, things like that.
“For us, our game has to be faster. Our movement has to be better. So these are things we have to improve on as we get further into the season.”
PLAYERS TO WATCH
LA Galaxy – Joseph Paintsil
After finishing as the club’s top scorer in the MLS last season, Paintsil will be hoping to hit the mark with a goal against NYCFC.
Against Sporting San Miguelito, he finished the match with team-high totals for shots on target (two), successful dribbles (four) and total duels (11).
NYCFC-Alonso Martinez
Martinez scored nine goals in road matches in the 2025 regular season, finishing second in a campaign in NYCFC history (behind David Villa – 10 in 2016).
Eight of those nine goals came in the second half, giving Martinez the most second-half road goals in a single season in NYCFC history.
MATCH PREDICTION: Draw
The LA Galaxy have won their last two meetings with NYCFC after the Pigeons won each of the previous four.
The Galaxy kept a clean sheet in both wins, having failed to do so in any of their first five meetings with NYCFC.
And they start the new season at Dignity Health Sports Park. All of the Galaxy’s seven regular-season wins in 2025 came at home, making them the first team with seven or more wins in a single regular season, all of which came at home, since the Portland Timbers in 2016 (12).
Including 2026, NYCFC have opened their season on the road in all 12 of their MLS campaigns. They have won just two of their previous eleven season openers (D3 L6), having gone winless in the last seven (D2 L5) dating back to 2019.
OPTA CHANCE OF WINNING
LA Milky Way – 39.6%
Draw – 26.6%
NYCFC – 33.8%
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