What indications?? I haven't seen anything to suggest that, especially for a team that still looks years and years away from breaking 8 or 9k.
I did say long term. Perhaps I'm reading too much into comments from the ever fallible "People in the know", that the Reign want to have games in CenturyLink and some mention of starting to have one or two games a season starting in the near future. But, again, there is the Defiance, up until this point, they have been the primary driver for the SSS, they are the ones with the ties to Tacoma's government and, most likely, they will be the ones that get the operation agreement for the SSS. I think that points to the stadium being scaled for their size, rather than the Reign. Particularly if I'm right that the Reign want to get into CenturyLink. if I'm wrong and the Reign do want to stay in Tacoma for the foreseeable future, that changes the equation quite a bit...
As of yesterday, the deal is official: OL Groupe have purchased the Reign Not much extra to discuss that wasn't said a month ago - at least not until/unless OLG starts making administrative moves! Side note: interesting figures present at the announcement were Maya Mendoza, general council for the Sounders, and the one and only Sonia Bompastor of FranceWNT and Washington Freedom fame. Interestingly, Bomp was there representing the OL Youth Academy system, so make of that what you will.
Hmmm. One of the reasons Henry gave for coming to play with the Thorns was she felt that Americans are better competitors than the French, they have a tremendous drive to win. Could OL Youth Academy be interested in an exchange program for their French youth players so they can come here to learn how to compete at the highest level? And vice versa, so our American youth players can learn what the French do better? Sort of a classic foreign exchange program for young players?
Is the Tacoma Dome suitable for soccer? I know that American football has been played there -- and the Dome seats about 20,000 people I dearly love Sonia Bompastor. Maybe she's angling for a job as Reign coach? She speaks good English.
I guess, but I'm not sure you'd want to.. I believe they have carpet over cement rather than trays and the like.
Looking at Lyon femenin attendance last year, the annual total attendance was about 35k, according to Wikipedia. That includes one match against PSG that had 25.9 k of the total. Low attendance was 635. The Reign attendance was 62,661 at a makeshift stadium, or over 2k more per game. Next year they play in a purpose made venue. Maybe Lyon are looking for someplace with better attendance.
Wow--that's a pretty lousy total attendance number for the best team in women's football. Who's going to be the new Reign coach? There are rumors that the UCLA coach is in play--maybe getting nudged out of her (good) current job because of the scandal?
I think it would have been lower, but that PSG match was sort of the send off for the NAT team that was going to win the WC. Lyon had lower attendance than any team in the NWSL, where even the bottom dwellers brought in over 40K. Take away the anomaly and Lyon looks really bad. The other 10 matches averaged under 1K. Even Sky Blue averaged 3,338. I doesn’t support the idea that the women’s game is catching up around the World, does it? Amanda didn’t sound like she was leaving after the College Cup.
Not sure how it helps the Lyon women team with attendance. Funny considering the Lyon location was where the women’s World Cup took place. Unless they are bringing in Lyon to NWSL.
I’ve seen some French league matches for women and yeah it looks pathetic in terms of attendance. Even for the most winning team. Maybe people just hating or bored with 1 team winning all the time or it’s too much men’s games being played at the same time. Don’t know if the French have similar system where they have a bunch of tiers in the pyramid like the English pyramid where you have probably hundreds of men’s clubs playing.
I suspect the short answer is sexism. The long answer is that while soccer is incredibly popular in France, it isn't as popular as it is in England, Germany, etc. and the dropoff is pretty severe as you get further down the table. https://www.worldfootball.net/attendance/fra-ligue-1-2018-2019/1/ As you can see from the above link, attendance in Ligue 1 definitely is not shabby in any sense, but the bottom clubs would cause serious hand wringing and much consternation if a MLS club had that attendance. Ligue 2 is just dismal and is on par with USL1. https://www.worldfootball.net/attendance/fra-ligue-2-2018-2019/1/ And National has a number of clubs whose attendance don't even hit 4 figures: https://www.worldfootball.net/attendance/fra-national-2018-2019/1/ So while soccer is popular in France and there are a lot of Men's teams, the popularity of the men's game shouldn't have as much impact on attendance to the women's games as it appears to have.
The D1 Arkema attendance are awful, the game is not marketed properly at all by the FFF. Only the NT games are given enough publicity. Therefore limited interest for women's football or any women's sport really. Attitudes take a long time to change. For example most of the grounds had good attendance at the world cup except for the 2 grounds in the south of France, which is unsurprising sadly. Regarding the Reign and OL Academy exchanging players, I expect this to happen very soon. Same at senior level if opportunities arise both ways.
The idea of youth academy exchange would be new ground. Maybe even prompt some of the top youth talent in USA to move out here for the chance at it.
I think the biggest question is will the kids be homesick. Horan said she struggled until Heath arrived at PSG.
I really like the idea. I spoke to Bill Predmore for a few minutes after the press conference on Thursday and i asked him about a coach -- he wouldn't give any hints. I asked about Gallimore specifically and he answered vaguely but in the negative.
It looks like the OL influence has started already: A French coach to @ReignFC ? @NWSL— Romain Balland (@RomBalland) January 6, 2020 You wonder if they will bring one of their former coach like Benstiti, Lair or Precheur to the Reign...
I'm actually just interested in which internationals we will persue. With an additional 300K to spare we should be able to get some good players.
I genuinely believe that Lyon will send one or two players to Reign at the end of the European season. Especially as France did not make the Olympics. There are a few who have said they'd love to play abroad before the end of their careers.
All of the reason mentioned here have some validity but it’s a little more complicated than “sexism”. soccer has only been a major sport for women here for about ten years whereas in the US it’s always been the women’s sport par excellence. before that a girl going out for a physical activity other than ballet would have looked at handball, volleyball, basketball, judo or fencing. You can’t compare popularity of men’s and women’s soccer in France the same way as for the US, it would be more accurate to compare women’s field hockey with the NFL, because in Europe top flight men’s soccer is the 16 ton gorilla that devours every other sport, men’s and women’s. Speaking particularly about OL women’s attendance, it’s true the lack of parity in the league is a handicap but for big games they play in the big stadium; recently they drew 26,000 for PSG and big CL matches often get close to 20,000 but opening a venue like that costs hella bucks. the run of the mill is played in the 1,500 seater across the parking lot and there have been 3-4 overflow crowds of about 2000 this season. There are plans to double that capacity soon.