Bronx, NY- While NYCFC have made significant strides over the last month in their level of play, Saturday's match against the Montreal Impact showed that the expansion side have plenty to fix, and fix quickly. The Impact beat NYCFC 3-2 at Yankee Stadium.

Montreal off to dream start

Montreal scored two goals in the first half, against an NYCFC club that they have already lost to twice this year.

Dominic Oduro gave the Impact an early lead in the 6th minute, receiving a long through ball in behind the defense, and burning past the New York defense to give the visitors the lead.

Ignacio Piatti doubled Montreal's lead in the 32nd minute, when he flicked the ball over City goalkeeper Josh Saunders and into the net with spectacular precision. Montreal took advantage of the sleeping and non-cohesive City backline, and used their speed to capitalize on the chances they were given.

Throughout the first half, New York struggled to complete long stretches of passes, and most times Andrea Pirlo resorted to dropping way back into the NYCFC half to collect the ball.

Ned Grabavoy, who was coming off a bad spell of performances, showed nothing to justify his selection in the starting eleven. Meanwhile, Kwadwo Poku and Mix Diskerud both showed great flashes during their time in the second half after coming on as substitutes.

New York gets back into the match

David Villa scored in the 68th minute, putting home a gift from the penalty spot to bring NYCFC back into the match. With the goal, Villa is now second in the league in goals scored.

Frank Lampard made his long, long, long awaited debut shortly after Villa's goal, and for the first time NYCFC had all three of their designated players on the pitch at the same time.

Montreal puts the game to bed

Montreal was gifted a very generous penalty from the referee in the 84th minute, which put the Canadian club in the driver's seat.

Tommy McNamara answered the goal with one of his own a minute later, making those NYCFC supporters who had started to leave come back for an exciting finale.

Despite some good build up play, NYCFC could not muster up an equalizer in the late stages of the match.

After the match, both Pirlo and Lamaprd spoke about their main hole in the team: defense. Lampard pointed out the amount of goals conceded in the last two matches (six), and the fact that there has not been consistency in the lineup selection.

Speaking of selection, many supporters and media were baffled as to why Grabavoy and Jason Hernandez were in the starting eleven.

In Grabavoy's case, it seems as if manager Jason Kreis keeps trying to give him another chance, but after another bad performance this writer doubts we will see him start the Hudson River Derby next weekend.

Hernandez started due to a nagging knock to Shay Facey. Kreis told the media that it was more of a fatigue factor, as this is also Facey's first year as a professional. 

Montreal hosts the Red Bulls on Wednesday, which will hopefully be the debut of Didier Drogba. 

New York City travels over to New Jersey next Sunday in the last Hudson River Derby of the regular season.