It's a lot more complicated than that. Although there is something to be said for the WPS over-reaching at times, the league more or less collapsed because of the actions of Borislow, because they needed his team and the team's revenue to keep going. The new model, although scaled smaller, will be more judiciously run. There is a market for womens football in the states, for obvious reasons (they are the best in the world), but at times they have been too optimistic in terms of grounds, fanbase, markets, etc. But in terms of how the womens teams reached out to local communities and became local icons for young female players, they played that hand near-perfectly.
We're likely to disagree about several of these things. I would never dispute the general douchebaggery of Borislow, and agree that his grandstanding was the final nail in the WPS coffin. As for the market being obvious, as a citizen and having played and coached since I was 6 years old, and currently working at TophatSoccdr Club, an all-girls club in Atlanta, I think you're being over-generous in your praise of reaching out to the respective local communities. As far as the Atlanta Beat were concerned, we did everything we could to get Tophat players to attend matches. The Beat did absolutely nothing in return. I have heard similar from coaches that worked in Boston and Washington DC, don't know about the other WPS clubs/locations.
And I'm far less certain than you that there is a market for women's professional football. Over here, parents don't want to watch unless their little Mia is playing; many of them are proud of that indisputably stupid position. No parents, market problems...
The USSF were also paying the National Team players in WPS too, IIRC. The bonus for the NWSL is that the FMF are also doing the same for the Mexican players, which opens up a whole new market for TV now for the NWSL.
You maybe right about this, but I was under the impression that one of the selling points of the NWSL was that the federations from both the US and Mexico were assuming the cost burden for National Team players. I'll research...
Edited to add bits of info from the excellent Soccer Insider,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/soccer-insider/a Washington Post soccer blog which covers DC United first, then US soccer and world football secondarily.
From the Insider,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/soccer-insider/wp/2013/05/08/wednesday-kickaround-8/ , scroll down to view...
*The Washington Spirit (0-2-2) reports 3,000 tickets sold for Saturday night’s visit by the Boston Breakers (2-0-1) at Maryland SoccerPlex, the NWSL club’s fourth consecutive home match. The Spirit is averaging 4,230 through three home dates, well above the 3,000 target set by the owner and bolstered significantly by the early visits from Abby Wambach (Western New York) and Alex Morgan (Portland).
*NWSL tonight: Chicago Red Stars at Sky Blue FC, 7 p.m. ET on www.youtube.nwslsoccer. Sky Blue drew just 2,611 for its home debut on a weekend last month.
Those attendance figures are generally normal ones for women's soccer stateside. Goff does a good job covering the NWSL for those who might be interested. Maybe we can get him to mention the Ladies...
