Also: will they be visible for people outside USA, specifically from Europe? Not sure I'll have the time to follow them entirely, but I wouldn't mind giving a glance to the matches from time to time.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B35QHACn-Ns/ So two NWSL players up for the Ballon D'or. What an embarrassment though. It shows that nobody really treats the women's game seriously. Marta, who is in the discussion for the all-time greatest, hasn't been Ballon D'or finalist worthy in years. Tobin Heath would probably admit that this wasn't close to her best year. Ada Hegerberg who is one of the top players today, chose to skip the World Cup. And Sam Kerr is nowhere to be seen. At least Alex Morgan isn't on this list, which unfortunately continues to be a popularity contest.
That's only a partial list. Here's the complete list: List of nominees revealed Lucy Bronze (Lyon) Ellen White (Manchester City) Sam Kerr (Chicago Red Stars) Nilla Fischer (VfL Wolfsburg) Amandine Henry (Lyon) Alex Morgan (Orlando Pride) Vivianne Miedema (Arsenal) Dzenifer Marozsan (Lyon) Pernille Harder (VfL Wolfsburg) Sarah Bouhaddi (Lyon) Marta (Orlando Pride) Ada Hegerberg (Lyon) Kosovare Asllani (CD Tacon) Sofia Jakobsson (CD Tacon) Tobin Heath (Portland Thorns) Megan Rapinoe (Reign FC) Lieke Martens (Barcelona) Sari van Veenendaal (Atletico Madrid) Wendie Renard (Lyon) Rose Lavelle (Washington Spirit) https://www.bbc.com/sport/football/50129027
Moving closer to a DP rule? https://www.si.com/soccer/2019/10/24/nwsl-future-expansion-player-signings-us-soccer (link courtesy @toad455 ) Also, some financial numbers, plus signs the office is growing (cc @AndyMead )
Not a surprise really, we see those numbers in Europe except there is no salary cap in Europe ( in most countries) so wages are likely to be higher for the rich teams.
Great article. A tribute not only for Chicago's Local 134 but to all the Supporters Groups in NWSL who have supported this league and its players with all their hearts and soul. https://victorypress.org/2019/10/23/chicago-red-stars-the-last-five-minutes/
I agree it was a great article. This quote: "Even now, as the Red Stars and Courage prepare to face off in an NWSL final in Cary, supporters groups of both clubs are working together to fundraise for Girls Rock! NC". summarizes what I like in women's football and what I always had a hard time finding in men's football (to the point that I abandoned it several years ago).
Huh? Most organized supporters groups for men's teams in the U.S. are fundraising engines for local charities. https://www.officialisc.com/single-...-Together-for-Childrens-Healthcare-of-Atlanta
Ok, I probably picked the wrong quote to summarize the feeling the whole article was giving to me, but consider that I live in Europe and that here men's football's organized supporters are generally much less social-aware (and sometimes quite thuggish instead). What I meant is that, everytime I followed men's football here in Europe the general atmosphere was much less relaxed, peaceful and sportsmanlike than what I found in women's football, and more similar to another quote from that article: "Some take supporter duties so seriously, stone-faced and raw, shouting from the capo's post like a coxswain or a drill sergeant, demanding more, louder, give it your all, show me you would die for this club." I'll adimit I've got no direct experience of what men's football organized supporters are in USA, so I was mostly comparing with my experience of European football, where the atmosphere at men's and women's events is clearly different. If you're so lucky in USA that the difference is not as much noticeable, that's good for you!
It's admittedly not a lot in the grand scheme of the entire season, but to give credit where credit is due, MLS has been doing some really good promotion for NWSL ahead of the championship match, despite the fact that no MLS-affiliated team is involved in said title game: https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2019...sted-nwsl-expansion-sacramento-could-join-too https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2019...-chicago-red-stars-how-watch-and-stream-final https://www.mlssoccer.com/post/2019/10/27/mls-clubs-interest-nwsl-continues-grow-behind-scenes (Still need to growth in coverage... e.g. there's an egregious error in them saying that the USWNT's 2019 WWC victory was the first title defense in the competition... I guess 2007 didn't happen?)
Okay, so it's sounding like it's going to more along the lines of TAM than it is along the lines of DPs: https://www.sbnation.com/2019/10/31/20940640/nwsl-expansion-salary-cap-plans-2020-world-cup Oh, yeah, true multi-year contracts are coming too. Hopefully some transparency will come with them! (Later in the article it talks about the relationship with the NWSLPA and the chance of a CBA happening. It was the MLSPA that forced their salaries to be published back when.)
If I understand it correctly, it's money that comes from the league (not the club owners) in order to "buy down" a player's salary. That is, while a Designated Player's salary is covered entirely by the club and the excess is simply not counted toward the individual max or team cap, a player covered by TAM is paid partially by the league (through funds that were granted to the club), and only the portion paid by the club's owners counts toward the individual limits & team cap. So a team can say "we want to pay this player $160k per year, but we're using $120k of the TAM given to us by NWSL on her so only $40k is coming from our account, and that's what counts toward the cap". Basically, it's what a lot of people have suggested USSF should do for allocation (just a pot of money to each team) instead of the by-player allocations.
And now that I think about it, it totally makes sense that NWSL is trying to go the TAM route than the DP route. Why? It's a looooot less stress on the independent owners, since the extra funds are coming from the league instead of from owners' pocketbooks. Going the DP route would put the independent owners at a massive disadvantage versus the MLS-backed owners. That said, less financial stress on the owners means more financial stress on the league, but between the efforts Budweiser is making at helping them get more sponsors and what they're hoping for from Octagon, I'm betting that NWSL is better they'll get more league-wide money coming in soon. (Expansion fees probably wouldn't hurt in that sense either.)
In MLS TAM (and GAM) are tools to prevent the donut hole effect often found in Salary Cap leagues where a few players get maxed out and then teams only have enough money left over for a bunch of minimum salary players. The career middle class (think Zerboni) type players get squeezed out. Where it works well with DPs is that it separates true budget busting multi-million/year DPs from really good players that are likely worth more than the league's maximum salary. In the past a lot of those tweener players, many USMNT pool players, were lost to Europe or Mexico as they weren't worth "wasting" a DP spot on, but they were worth more than the "maximum". Instead of just raising the league's salary budget a couple of million, but instead giving each team that money in the form of "TAM" it creates the incentive to keep those players. To be able to buy down salaries below the "maximum". But it also becomes an asset that can be traded. In MLS, TAM is awarded on a year by year basis, and it's "use it or lose it" money. Teams can trade TAM for draft picks, international spots, players, whatever. Without a DP mechanism, it's impact in NWSL would be different. But in both cases it would be primarily a player retention mechanism.
New compensation guidelines for 2020: http://www.nwslsoccer.com/news/article/nwsl-announces-new-2020-compensation-guidelines
Okay, it's time for Friday News Drop Day, and we have confirmation of the new compensation system: http://www.nwslsoccer.com/news/article/nwsl-announces-new-2020-compensation-guidelines Team cap raised to $650k Player minimum raised to $20k Player maximum raised to $50k Allocation money of up to $300k given to each team Six different ways that players may qualify for receiving allocation money Player contracts can extend multiple years; cannot include extra work Teams can do transfers with non-NWSL teams to acquire or sell players; purchases use the new allocation money; USSF players cannot be sold Gah, ninja'd!
Hangonhangonhangon... The release says that "Teams may purchase up to $300,000 in allocation money from the league", not that teams are given $300k in allocation money. That's a big difference from what MLS does with its TAM/GAM, to my understanding... And it really puts the smaller owners at a disadvantage again. I'm not sure I'm a fan of this, if the language was specific in that sense.
And the abomination that is the 2019 Best and Second XIs lives with us as an eligibility determinant for allocation funds through the 2021 season. Fortunately most of those overlooked like Debinha (>3 international appearances) and Hinkle (domestic player with 5 years of league play) will qualify through other criteria, but the fact that the league included the Best XIs at all just highlights what a horror show this year's awards are.