Vieira has no experience as a professional head coach. He retired as a player in 2011, from the English club Manchester City, after a career in which he won league titles with Arsenal, Inter Milan and Juventus — although the Juventus title was vacated after a refereeing scandal — and in which he lifted both the World Cup and European Championship trophies with France. Since retiring, he had worked for Manchester City in a variety of roles, most recently as the organization’s under-21 coach.

Now, he said, he is eager for another challenge.

Vieira said he had job offers in the Premier League, in England’s second-tier Championship and in France’s Ligue 1. But he opted for a three-year contract in New York.

“To manage a first team, to manage a team with big potential, to build a successful football club, this is what I wanted to do,” he said.

Two weeks ago, his former France teammate Zinedine Zidane was also appointed to his first managerial job, at the Spanish juggernaut Real Madrid, with virtually the same qualifications as Vieira. They exchanged wishes of good luck, Vieira said, and while Vieira’s new post is much lower down the global soccer hierarchy, it was surely not the easiest job available to him. Dozens of foreign managers have been put in charge of M.L.S. teams without any prior experience in the league, as a coach or player, and only a few of them were able to adapt to the league’s quirks — salary caps, roster limits, cross-country travel — and find success, especially initially.

Vieira, by his own admission, “may not have the best knowledge of the league,” but he expressed confidence that he could overcome that shortcoming.

“I think what is important is to be aware of the difficulty that I can find,” he said. “I have to be conscious of it, and I have to plan for it.”