I think you will see most of the WPS teams with relationships with both W-Leauge and WPSL teams. Boston also has partnerships with a W-League and WPSL teams. I think both leagues have a place on the US soccer landscape. Would I prefer that they would come together, sure but don't see that happening any time soon. Again, I think both leagues have some really good teams, some average teams and some not so good teams. But the WPSL, similar to the NPSL, provide a less expensive entry point for launching a team. Also both leagues are providing a great opportunity for female soccer players in this country to improve and advance.
which league is stronger? W-League championship: Pali Blues 2, FC Indiana 1 WPSL championship: Ajax 3, Arizona 1 Open Cup championship: FC Indiana 1, Ajax 0 no more arguments!
If I recall correctly, the W-League took a big hit when WUSA started. They had grown to the point of having 2 divisions, and a pretty strong continental footprint. WUSA pulled a lot of top players and decimated some top teams. I don't recall numbers, but the Boston Renegades were coming off back-to-back championships and had many of their starters drafted by WUSA. There was also a league-wide contraction that took some time to recover from. In a perfect world, everyone would be friends and work for the good of the game, and we would see the leagues merged, probably under the USL banner but with the good WPSL stuff intact. And that would make it more practical to go back to multiple divisions to sort the elite from the rec leaguers. The WPSL advantages of lower entry costs and more autonomous regional operations could easily be applied, particularly at a D2/D3 level for start-ups. To follow the divorce analogy, a reconciliation or remarriage may be in order to take advantage of the WPS situation rather tha have it hurt both parties again.
What would the draw back be to having a W-League-1 (semi-pro) and a W-League-2 (collegiant/high school)?
That could work, I think there are some NCAA rules/agreements that impact the current arrangements regarding pro status. I just would like to see the teams grouped competitively, within realistic logistic and operational constraints. Both leagues seem to have far too wide a range of skill levels playing against each other. Would also like to see the two leagues consolidate their position, either together or individually, to mitigate the negative impact WPS may have both in terms of player availability and competition for fan time/dollars.
Right now, the major problem would be HUGE travel budgets. W-League had 41 clubs in 2008, from Vancouver to Tampa Bay, from Toronto to Los Angeles. You could end up with some really isolated teams if the W-League split in two. However, i too would love to see a semi-pro W-L. Maybe if all the WPS commits to reserve squads, which is apparently the arrangement that FC Indiana will have with the Chicago Red Stars, then a semi-pro league could be created without weakening the existing W-League too much.
Looks like W-1 W-2 existed from 1998-2001. They did do interleague scheduling, but IIRC the W-2 teams were very regionalized, while the W-1 travelled a bit further, but there weren't any East/West Coast regular season matches, not much different than the present. From the USL website archives: http://www.uslsoccer.com/aboutusl/history/53789.html 1998... W GOES TWO FOR ONE -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Continued growth and success prompted USL to divide the elite women’s league into two levels in 1998, forming W-1 and W-2. Teams in the two leagues would continue playing interleague games for travel-purposes but the mission was simple. If multiple levels worked for the men’s side of the sport, there was no reason why it shouldn’t for the women’s side.
I think it would be a good idea if there were no WPS - I'm not sure there's enough talent out there to support three levels of women's club soccer.
With only 6-8 WPS clubs to start, only the most elite W-L/WPSL players are going to move to the new league, but some strong clubs will suffer multiple player losses. If the W-L and WPSL worked together to set up multiple regional lower division leagues, with broader regional conferences for the higher division, I think it could work, but that is a huge if.
Add another 51 WPSL teams with an equally broad but different geographic distribution from the W-League and there are now 91 teams with a pretty solid national/continental footprint. If the two leagues were to merge, there would be some necessary contraction and the arrival of WPS would also have an impact, but you would still have a lot of teams with a lot of opportunity for reasonable local and regional rivalries... travel could be a more or less controllable expense in most cases. However, what I see as the most compelling argument for establishing two levels of play is for enhanced competition. In both leagues in all conferences there seemed to be dominate, presumably elite teams that simply slaughtered the have-nots on a regular basis. That is not good developmentally nor is it good business over the long run.