WPSL PRO Interview Part 4: Enabling development
This is the final part of our interview with WPSL PRO Project Director Benno Nagel. The first three parts can be found here, here and here.
Where does WPSL PRO fit as a place for player development? Nagel is ebullient.
There’s just so much territory that has not been occupied by these different leagues. The up and coming prospect is an easy story to conceptualize but think about the NWSL second chance player, or Luca Toni (who progressed from the lower league Serie C in Italy to a World Cup win in only 7 years)
Where would that player come from in America? If he was a woman in America, that would never happen. He would’ve become an accountant or a school teacher or whatever he would’ve gone on to do in his career professionally other than soccer. I don’t know if it’s gonna be 2027, but imagine in 2031 when the Women’s World Cup is here in North America and there’s an athlete that maybe makes the Women’s World Cup team that started her professional journey in 2027 or 2028 with the WPSL PRO? There could be an athlete that could for whatever reason, not get signed by an NWSL club, not get signed by a Super League club, maybe wind up with the WPSL PRO Club on a good multi-year contract to start and they just crush it. Next thing they get transferred to an NWSL club or they get transferred to some higher level program and they continue to succeed and then they make it into the national team and play in the World Cup. And you could trace that player’s moment of their breakthrough back to the WPSL PRO. That would be like insane, in a good way. That’s what we feel the opportunity is, who would be the women’s Luca Toni in American soccer right now? You wouldn’t have ’em, they would be out of soccer. Or think about an NWSL athlete that had a horrific injury, or maybe stepped away from the game to start their family or had some other reason that they needed to take a one or two year hiatus and now they’re looking to come back into play professionally. The WPSL PRO could be a spot for them to do that.
Over the next few weeks we will be bringing you profiles of some of the emerging markets in WPSL PRO, along with all the beginning of the Minnesota Super Cup, WPSL, UPSL and NPSL for this season. Anything else you want us to cover? Drop me a line at tim@lightsfootball.com or let us know on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter or Bluesky.