While the current collective agreement was set to expire in 2026, the NWSL and the players’ union agreed on a new historic version. In a country where professional sports offer its players only limited choice over which team they represent, which can also be transferred from one day to the next, the NWSL becomes the first professional league to change its modus operandi. It is therefore now in line with what is generally done around the world, and it is the players who come out as winners with both more freedom in their career choices and guarantees on their contracts, as well as better supervision and better working conditions.
Gone is the draft, a seminal event in American professional sports, no more transfers to the other side of the country without consent, no more salary caps and other niceties of the championship. From now on, players will be able to sign wherever they want from the end of their college career – if they go through university. In addition to the assurance of guaranteed contracts, the NWSL’s business model, which is performing well, proposes raising the minimum wage to more than €43,000 ($48,500) from next season for a payroll of $3.3 million. (almost €3m), with the goal of seeing it almost double by 2030 ($82,500 or more than €73,500 for a payroll capped at $5.5m, or almost €5m, or even more depending on the income generated of the championship), ends planned for this new collective agreement.
In addition to the progress mentioned above, the league plans increased compensation for all end-of-season bonuses – in a league that is happy with individual rewards -, better care in case of maternity and the players’ children, expanded staff and better monitoring , especially in relation to mental health, better travel conditions during the season, which has often been criticized given the long journeys required to travel in such a championship… in short, this agreement is a historic step forward for a league that has continued to grow since its inception in 2013, despite working conditions that are not always impeccable from a sporting point of view, and scandals (various harassment among others) not so rare than that. The summer championship format should also be quickly put back on the table.
While we are already seeing more and more players leave the top European championships to join the USA (in D1, Delphine Cascarino and Perle Morroni came to San Diego from Lyon, but Rosemonde Kouassi will wear Washington’s colors after Fleury, PSG player Ramona Bachmann was came to Houston before the end of the season in France and several players joined the new league, the USL), improvements to the league, which now offers working conditions that few clubs – let alone the championships as a whole – in. Europe will be able to compete, what about the situation on the old continent?
Currently, the limited number of places in the NWSL (fourteen teams, a fifteenth from Boston) and its summer format, which does not fit the international calendar, limit the “threat” that the USA poses for the top European championships. But a change in format and the emergence of the USL could make the United States the new stronghold of women’s soccer, as it once was when European championships were less developed. They will likely need to do better at every level to maintain their prestige and competitiveness, starting with their best players.
