As a slight redirect, any thoughts on Euro women's leagues?

As a slight redirect, any thoughts on Euro women's leagues?
by Irish2003 (2020-10-09 12:29:25)

In reply to: I'm gonna have to disagree on the last point. posted by NDMike2001

I'm far from an expert, but it seems like one of the major factors in our USWNT success was the U.S. having a head start, both with excellent college teams (which seem more relevant for the women's game than men's where they often go pro very young a la Messi) such that the dream of the "Bend it like Beckham" protagonists was to go to Santa Clara, and the early women's pro leagues. The supermoney coming into the women's game - EPL, La Liga, etc - seems like it should be great for the sport, and many of our American players will deservedly benefit too, but it also seems like it may be an equalizer with European players staying home and developing.

I can't tell if it will be like the WNBA where players may play both in the U.S. and abroad, or if they will focus on the big money Euro deals, and my fear is that it could be kinda like ND football where we had our own network but now everyone is on some sort of TV whether conference or ESPN-7, Fox Sports-Central Missouri, etc. Overall, I think we will still be fine and it's great for the players & sport, but our days of coasting are over, esp as shown by not necessarily winning every WC and Olympics anymore

Obviously Title IX gave the US a big jump.

Free college was a nice incentive for families that probably didn’t otherwise care about women’s sports. But if the USWNT teaches us anything it’s that success doesn’t particularly bring in the kind of revenue that men’s teams generate. So despite the ability to home grow good players I think we’ll continue to lose players to teams tied to big clubs. And those countries will likely catch up because of the pay to play restrictions on the overall player pool in the US.