Some people just like the direct attacking style, it's not bad but with a good playmaker you can control the field, change the tempo when you want and the opponent will be hard to react in time. I believe you remember in 2002 with Reyna we totally controlled the field in the match against Germany, just lost to the amazing Kahn.
I would like to ask Peter Wilt of what he thinks of the idea of MLS and WPS affiliating and associating with one another. Is this a good idea? Will MLS ever succumb to an idea like this? If anyone can give us some quality insight of whether this would work or not is a guy who was General Manager of MLS Chicago Fire during it's most successful days and former President and owner of WPS Chicago Red Stars and one of the guys who helped launch WPS, Peter Wilt. Peter, if you're reading this what do you think?
As someone who has posted plenty about MLS and women's soccer, nothing Lalas says is news to me. But he does not go far enough. Affiliation keeps a league afloat for the short term. And there are immediate benefits. But to thrive ( and thus make some MLS owners even semi-interested) the league has to become WMLS. I have been saying this for a long time. For example, Sporting KC would want a team whose brand IS the sporting club, clad in all light blue at home. Not some other brand that dilutes the local brand. And more importantly, they want a cut of all the jerseys sold, if they were to develop the next Alex Morgan. Moreover, I reject the premise the the women's game takes anything from the men's side. It does just the opposite. It adds value through goodwill and and branding that go beyond the bottom line. Although money will be indeed be lost on paper in the short run if MLS was to run a women's division, it will pay-off long term. And that is why I have always maintained that WMLS is at least a decade away. Until then, the USWNT will still be be college player based and falling further behind Germany, and france etc in terms of player development.
And to the amazing Frings... For those wondering about WUSA's start up and MLS, here is the timeline as best I can remember: The 1999 players hired MLS COO Mark Abbott to write a business plan for a fledgling league. He actually wrote three - one was basically a WMLS, one had a good degree of independence but still shared some resources and marketing with MLS, and one was a totally independent league. The women chose door #3. While everyone, including MLS, agreed that the women having their own league was best for everyone (including a struggling MLS), MLS still saw the mutual benefit of the two leagues cooperating and looked to do so. WUSA, be it some of the '99 players or those they surrounded themselves with, thought they were bigger than Jesus and actually believed they could only benefit MLS and MLS could do nothing for them. A 99er was famously quoted as saying they didn't want MLS piggybacking on their attendances (BS vets like to attribute this to Foudy, but the article only gave attribution to a founding player). Why a league just starting down a road MLS had been on for 5 years was passing up an opportunity to pick their brains clean is beyond me. So to bring some of the WUSA swelled heads down to earth a bit, MLS launched a farcial competing bid for a Div I women's league to the USSF. The 99ers signed an oath in blood that they would only play for WUSA. In the end, WUSA came to some sort of vague agreement of cooperation with MLS and MLS subsequently dropped the 'bid'. On a local level, the attitude of some Freedom staffers towards DC United was pretty shocking. As a fan of both teams, it was tough for me to stomach the Freedom some after that. Of course, the swelled heads continued spending like rock stars until someone noticed all the money was gone and we know what the end result was. Fast forward to the present - I don't believe the past will have any effect on a possible future relationship with MLS and women's soccer. While I lack details to know if it's really feasible, MLS is now in a much more stable position to consider fostering a women's league. I'm on board with Alexi that teams with some history and infrastructure is more economical then re-inventing the wheel. Linking up MLS sides can also help draw more mainstream fans into the women's game. For those unfamiliar with Lalas, his most enduring legend with the US Men was scoring against England in 1993. His celebration of said goal is among the more iconic images in US soccer history.