NY International FC
Welcome everyone back to LowerLeagueUSA. We take the time to interview clubs around the country so you can learn more about them and behind the scenes of running a lower league club. This time we had the pleasure of speaking with the president of NY International FC about the ins and outs of their club.
Corentin, I want to start by thanking you for giving me your time for an interview to highlight you and your club in the busy soccer market of New York City. You founded the club back in 2019 in the 4th division of the Cosmopolitan Soccer League, and have managed to not only survive COVID as a club, your club has been promoted twice and currently compete in the 2nd division.
I know we have spoken in the past, but it’s time for the city, and country to get to know you and your club better.
Please let everyone know who you are, and a brief history of you and soccer.
My name is Corentin Claisse, 33, and originally from Landivisiau, France. I am currently the president of NY International FC where I started playing when the club was founded in 2019. I have played soccer for as long as I can remember, started at 5 years old and played for my local club: Landi F.C. until I was 20. I was lucky to have incredible childhood memories of professional football success with both my club, RC Lens winning the 1998 D1 title (first and only in history), as well as France winning the WC a month after. I could not have dreamed of a better way to get inspired. As a player, I rarely go past the half-way line and love playing as a Defensive Midfielder, having Bixente Lizarazu (LB) and Claude Makelele (CDM) as my role models.
What was the motivation behind starting the club? Why the name ‘New York International FC’?
The motivation came from wanting to build something different than what we were experiencing at the time. The club started as a branch out of a previous team we were a part of called Beyond FC. The founding board was entirely made of European players (France, England, Ireland, Poland) and we all shared a really common way of how a football club should operate and what we were looking to build. Our principles are really embraced by our motto: “Rise, Together as One”. What’s behind it are 3 key principles:
– The club aims to be competitive. We are not a Beer League type of team. We practice every week and we are set-up as professionals. We provide full game review and analytics. Video highlights and scouting reports on our opponents to players. We started at the really bottom of the soccer pyramid and we only believe in true promotion relegation that the Cosmopolitan Soccer League provides.
– The club aims to be welcoming. One of the biggest battles we fight is the “pay-to-play” mentality of soccer in the United States. We pride ourselves in providing an affordable solution to any player in the area. We also provide up to 6 grants per year to let a player who does not have the mean to pay the fee to play for free with us (a season includes 25+ games, training every week, free training kit).
– The club aims to have a local impact. NY is one of the most transitory city in the world. Who is really a true New Yorker? Who expects to live here their whole life? A vast majority of people are immigrants yet we want to represent NYC. What is NYC? A vibrant city that breathes diversity. This is why working closely with a charity is key for us as we want to give back to a city that welcomed us but this is also why we are New York International. We are not one community, we are all of them.
What’s the mission of NY International FC? The Goals?
In terms of specific goals, a few things standout:
– Establishing ourselves long-term. The first 5 years are here for the creation of the brand, setting up the right foundations to ensure long-term viability of the club. Establishing a pool of players that want to play with us and embrace our values. Finding the right balance for the board members and the right boundaries to make it work.
– Being the best team in the US soccer pyramid. The dream for us is to continue climbing the ladders and bringing trophies and titles and cementing our presence in the top teams in NY. We compete against 50+ year old teams who have access to an incredible pool of money but we are determined to do it.
– Expanding the NY International Brand. 5 year horizon there is hopefully a woman side that will run under the NY International banner. Alongside that woman side expansion, we are also thinking – as most of the founders have now aged 4 years since inception – of adding O30/40 teams. Down the line, potentially creating an academy but this comes with its own set of challenges.
What are the challenges of running a lower league club?
1. Money. How do you afford to run a club especially with the high goals that we have from a sporting standpoint? Being a newer club, we had to start everything from scratch and this include having reliable sources of income to ensure we are not spending personal money. When we started, we were lucky to find friends and family who sponsored the team but now we have been able to expand to true partnerships as we have established ourselves as a brand in the community.
2. Commitment. Both for the people involved behind the scenes but also players. At the end of the day, we are all volunteers who only do this for the love of the club. The board spends countless hours to ensure the players only have to focus on playing and nothing else. This is also true with players, how do we retain players, how do we get them behind the ethos of what the club represents… This is also why we want to move higher up in the ladder, on a weekly basis, because of our strong and professional looking social media presence, we have players asking us for contracts (which we don’t offer) but it is
3. Time. We all have lives, this is a side gig but that requires its fair share of work and how do you manage all of it as efficiently as possible!
What are the challenges of running a club in the concrete jungle?
NYC is a city like no other in the US. What makes NYC great is that it is continuously moving and changing. However, this is what makes it difficult. So many times we have players joining for a season, maybe 2 and then work assignments changed. They moved to another city, back home… The transitory aspect of NYC is hard to get the commitment and even fan base to be built. Another piece is the lack of proper football infrastructure outside of the Colleges/High School which require too much money for us to even consider. Look, even the NYC professional team does not have its own stadium! We have to rely on public parks but they are run in a very antiquated way. Ultimately, being in NYC means being able to adapt. We don’t often play at the same place, we do not have a “home field” and even less stands and/or locker rooms
How difficult has it been to establish a presence within the city?
In NYC, we are not just competing with other soccer teams, we are not even competing with other sports to be honest. We are simply competing with all the possible activities that the city has to offer. The amount of things to do at any moment in time in NYC makes it extremely challenging to establish a presence and get attention. At the same time, there is demand, people will follow you if you manage to strike one of their values. As mentioned before, how do you establish a fan base or a club loyalty for people who are always in transit? Few people come to NYC thinking where they are spending the next 5/10 years, so we need to find new and creative ways to get ourselves known. However, the great part is we are able to truly touch on many more people than any other club that is deeply rooted in a small city for example.
What does attendance look like for your games? How are you able to get people to not only come to the games, but KEEP coming to the games?
Unfortunately, attendance right now is pretty small. We managed to get about 50 people when we played finals but for regular season we are lucky to have over 2. This is not necessarily due to the appeal of the game but more a combination of things:
– No home field and therefore no chance to build around 1 specific area. Additionally, most of the games we play are played at Randall’s Island, not easily accessible via public transport and no stands at all…
– We also have not pushed it yet because we want to do it right. Our focus next is to get the games live streamed and in partnership with our sponsors (Rivercrest Bar in Astoria, Queens) to broadcast them live. Getting interest from people realizing that an Amateur team is playing at their local bar will be key to grow the community.
There are plenty of leagues available for lower league sides, especially in the NY Metro area, why the Cosmopolitan League?
There are actually not that many competitive leagues in the NY Metro Area. There is the CSL, the LISFL (Long Island Soccer Football League) that is the equivalent of the CSL but more geared towards Long Island. The UPSL is the most direct competition for the league and finally Gotham which is more amateur.
The CSL was the right fit for us because of:
– The promotion/relegation which matches how us the founders have always thought about football.
– The quality and professionalism of the league.
– The price. Unlike the UPSL that has more of a pay to play approach, the CSL is really affordable.
I know there are a plethora of clubs within the city limits, what separates NY International FC from the rest of them?
Hopefully the brand we are building is attracting players and fans alike. Showcasing professionalism on social media and building a reputation of a club that cares and has value is how we try to differentiate ourselves. We are not the only ones obviously with this but then being open and welcoming to everyone when a lot of teams are ethnicity centric (NY Ukrainians, NY Albanians, Manhattan Celtic…).
Your club competes in a league that has promotion/relegation, how do you think that benefits your club, and the competition around you?
That is one of the main reasons why we joined the CSL. In terms of our club, it pushes us to really bring the best week in week out in order to get promoted. Ultimately, some players are still young and may have some aspirations to play at a higher level and they could very well do that with us as we have already been promoted twice in 4 years. There is a reason why the CSL has been around for 100 years, it is because it remains a very competitive league in the NY Metro area and while it is not professional, there is a path to semi-professionalism with the EPSL.
Do you think we could effectively do Pro/Rel in the USA?
A lot of people have thought about this question for a much longer time and much deeper interest that I have done. Do I want Pro/Rel in the US? Heck yeah! Would love to be that club that started at the bottom, rose through the ranks and lifts the title at the top of the pyramid. Now the size of the US makes it extremely challenging and it becomes really expensive really quickly which means that club could be in trouble financially by this level of instability (which is why the NASL has not worked, NISA is surviving, etc…).
Ultimately, it is a question of who wants it, who holds the power and is there a desire to do it. In the current environment and ecosystem, it is unfortunately dead on arrival.
What advice would you give to a person wanting to start a lower league club here in the United States?
First, I believe that this is a task that you should not do on your own. The responsibilities and the endless list of tasks can be extremely overwhelming especially for no immediate rewards (and definitely 0 financial rewards). Sharing the burden of building the right foundations is key and this is why the club was created by multiple members. What I am saying here is not that it is ‘impossible’ to do it alone but doing it alone can be the cause of a quick burn-out. Then, look around, what are other clubs doing around you. What do you like about these clubs? What do they do well? What would you do differently? Ultimately, the club one builds is in the image of the values they want to put forward. We have seen people leaving our team and reproducing some of the steps we had chosen to grow the club (shoutout to Jon Hill from Peachtree FC and Ali Reza from Pint FC): emphasis on approaching the game as professionally as one can, a structured board, a dedicated social media, access to game footage, etc… And both these teams used some of our playbook and made their own one out of it. Either locally or via the incredible lower league community on Twitter, there is a ton of resource and people willing to help available!
There are plenty of successful clubs in the lower leagues today, is there one you look up as the model/standard for building and growing a club?
To make a brief distinction between locally and other clubs. I believe that what Hoboken FC and CPR have built within the Cosmo League is pretty impressive. These are long standing clubs obviously (1912 and 1999 respectively) but they show what success looks like when you put the right ingredients in it. Lansdowne is probably the grail for us in terms of what to achieve with a solid academy, some regional and national titles (including a 2021/22 undefeated season) and a longevity that is exciting to see with a true community involved behind them.
Now looking outside of the NY region, I love seeing what Dekalb County United is doing in Illinois, what Maryland Bobcats are doing in Maryland or Providence FC up north in Rhode Island. There are so many great clubs out there that I am missing many of them and I apologize for it!
Once again, thank you very much for your time Corentin. I’m honored you gave me the opportunity to discuss your club inside and out! I wish you and your club success and longevity on and off the pitch!
Make sure to follow NY International FC, the Cosmopolitan Soccer League, and LowerLeagueUSA on social media. You can find the links below
