Fc gold pride folds

[jasonm]

SAN FRANCISCO -- The defending champion FC Gold Pride of Women's Professional Soccer have folded after two years of operation.

The Bay Area team says it is disbanding because of slow ticket sales and costly cross-country travel. Its players become free agents Wednesday.

WPS chief executive Anne-Marie Eileraas says it is "disappointing" the club "did not find the level of support it aimed for in its market."

The league will have six teams next season in Atlanta, Boston, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Washington and Western New York. A Chicago franchise is seeking investors and hopes to join the league for 2011. The deadline is Dec. 15.

[navycyr]

That's unfortunate. The way I see it USA will loose the hedge it has in women professional soccer to the benefit of Europe where professionnal clubs are forced to invest in women soccer. Within five years from now I expect top women soccer players play in Europe rather than in the United States. That's sad for us as well as for USA since it will be tougher for our women to find places in the top league than it is actually.

[Richard]

I will be surprised (pleasantly) if the WPS even manages to finish it's 2011 season.

[hc1]

I will be surprised (pleasantly) if the WPS even manages to finish it's 2011 season.

Its my understanding that the teams are all required to post a bond with enough money to complete the season. This is a new policy that they put in after the folding of St. Louis. So - it the teams start the season, it should mean that they will complete the season.

[Richard]

From the WPS website...

"Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) will play its 2011 WPS Season with teams in Atlanta, Boston, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Washington and Western New York following those teams satisfying the league’s reserve funding requirement. The Chicago Red Stars continue to seek investors to secure a place in the league’s 2011 season as a seventh team and have been granted until December 15 to do so."

They only have six teams confirmed and there is no lineup of teams/investors looking for a spot in the league. Not a good sign.

[Vic]

The Bay Area team says it is disbanding because of slow ticket sales and costly cross-country travel.

Tickets sales are not a natural force, like the wind or rain. They're the outcome of business decisions. The 'Pride' were a naive concept poorly executed operationally.

The answer for North American women's soccer in general is likely a modest 2,000 breakeven point between the WPS and W/WPSL, with heavy corporate sponsorship, community marketing and federation assistance. And meagre as it sounds - that's still worlds if not universes ahead of almost every other country in the world.

[CanadianSoccerFan]

That's unfortunate. The way I see it USA will loose the hedge it has in women professional soccer to the benefit of Europe where professionnal clubs are forced to invest in women soccer. Within five years from now I expect top women soccer players play in Europe rather than in the United States. That's sad for us as well as for USA since it will be tougher for our women to find places in the top league than it is actually.

I'm curious to know what is the state of the women's pro game in Europe? Which countries (if any) have fully professional set ups? I'm guessing Germany? I'm just curious because is WPS dies again it could force some of our best Canadian women into retirement or at least part time play.

[Vic]

Germany, England next year, Sweden, Norway, Spain, Italy, France... there are a lot of places you can make reasonable to good money at the upper end (Schelin is rumoured over 150K in France). But the lower end is still quite low in all. There is also Brazil and Japan and even Australia/NZ but they're less commoditized internationally. The Oceania leagues are definitely less money and a lower standard. I seem to remember someone doing a masters thesis on the leagues and the professionalization of women's soccer globally but have lost the contact info. You may be able to track them down with some googling.

I'm a big fan and don't think there's any chance of it, but if the WPS dies, it dies. In it's 2010 and future state it does very little to affect our national program. And there's not much difference between playing in the USA or playing in Europe. It's not your home or Canada either way. And the WPS and US Soccer aren't exactly free trade partners either, so they might as well be Europe anyway.

International Women's Leagues

[StrandOne]

http://bit.ly/enw36Z

I think Jeff printed Nancy's answers verbatim... including the "don't quote me on this" comments. Could it have been more polished? Yes. But I appreciate finally hearing the UNVARNISHED ANSWERS to questions many of us wanted to ask. Thanks Jeff!

INGRID

[tmcmurph]

Too bad. LA Sol and now this one. Pity it was decent footie.

PS. I like the new layout with the MNT and WNT the top 2 listings on the forum page. Country top, then clubs etc below. Nice.

[Vic]

Me too murph... makes more sense too.

I kid you not - all 19 from her answer to just the first question in the interview:

1. nothing ever materialized
   
2. we got no sponsors
   
3. we hardly had anyone sign up for season tickets
   
4. the Bay Area, for whatever reason, was not interested
   
5. based everything on having three to four thousand fans and sponsors and we didn’t get any of that
   
6. no one came
   
7. they are just not that interested
   
8. We didn’t get one person interested
   
9. no one is stepping up to help us
   
10. We carried the team for two years
    
11. we would have gone forward if we had gotten any kind of response from the public and we didn’t
    
12. there just wasn’t the fan base
    
13. we didn’t have all these people sign up for season tickets
    
14. we didn’t have sponsors calling us
    
15. we couldn’t get any doors open
    
16. People just were not interested
    
17. People just were not interested in coming
    
18. we were getting excuses from people
    
19. if they were true fans people would have come out, they would have come out
    

WUSA died from bleeding cash but the CyberRays never answered a question like that. There's always more to the picture than meets the eye.

[The Ref]

She said something like "build it and they will come" which obviously didn't happen in this case. Would I be wrong to think that sometimes it is not enough to sit around waiting for the phone to ring, but one rather need to embark in an all out marketing campaign to attract all kinds of people to games. Two years is enough time to figure a fresh approach. Maybe she did all this. It does not come out that way in her interview.

[CoachRich]

I asked one of my friends who's daughter plays in LAFC what's going on with the female game in Cali. Here is part of her response -

In CA , we are a pay to play culture and the higher level you play , the more you pay that is for group private training and private training, physical training.....(for girls, boys is a different story as they can generate income )

Most parents do not want their kids to play in women's pro soccer , it is a sports that cannot sell tickets ...even MLS is struggling on that.

I would say most parents want their kids to get a college scholarship.

Soccer is not a US sports ( football, baseball, hockey is ) and women's soccer especially NOT . The women sports that are watched :tennis, pool , golf even lingerie bowl but not soccer !! Sad enough even our girls players do not watch women's league. They watch La Liga, Serie A , EPL. not WPSL.

No viewers, no franchaise , no league."