First Touch Weekly | London City Lionesses Are Going For It

0:00It's massive for the league to be signing one of the biggest women's footballers of all time. You know, two ballendors, someone who is a World Cup winner, multiple champions league titles, and is very much, you know, has been the face of women's football along with all the big stars in the global game recently. So it's huge for the league to have her. Hello everyone and welcome to First Touch Weekly, the American home for the global game. We're glad you're here. I'm Susanna Fuller. Well, the WSL kicks off its 16th season this weekend and in a world where women's soccer leagues have folded far too soon. Every new season feels like a gift and this season should be the WSL's most exciting yet within always exciting title race. Some new faces on the pitch and the touchline and most intriguingly, an attempt by an ambitious owner and some world-class players to do something completely new. But first, the news. It was an electric start to the Bundesliga season with title holders Bayern Munich kicking

1:03the season off with a 5-1 drumming of Stuttgart. The most exciting result, however, was Bundesliga new boys S.V. Elvarsburg shocking Bayern-Laver Cusen 3-2 in front of their home fans at the still being renovated Ursa Farm Arena. Elvarsburg are a true Bundesliga fairy tale, hailing from the tiny village of Speeson Elvarsburg. A town of just about 13,000 people, Elvarsburg were competing in the regional fourth tier of German football in 2022. And last weekend, they knocked off the 2024 Champions. Pretty cool stuff. In less fun news, one of Borussia Dortmund's biggest summer signings, Giannis Constantilius ruptured his ACL just 54 minutes into his debut with the black and yellow. The injury is a huge blow for Dortmund who are now left scrambling to find his replacement as the transfer window is about to shut. Elsewhere, women's clubs all around the UK are preparing for the WSL season, which kicks off

2:09this weekend. We'll dive into things with women's football expert, Flow Lloyd Hughes, and just a bit. But one club that probably wishes it had a bit more of an offseason is Brighton, whose manager, Dario Vidosic, abruptly left the club last Friday, just a week ahead of the new season. Vidosic had a successful run with the Seagulls last season, leading them to a fifth place league finish and an appearance in their first FA Cup final. The departure reportedly came as a shock to most Brighton players, but the club quickly filled the void with formal rail Sociadad manager Arturo Ruiz. Vidosic had been linked with a vacancy at Angel City who fired their manager in June. And finally, now that he's back in Miami, Leo Messi continues to do very messy things. Leo L. Messi continuing on, Messi between three defenders, Messi want to move, want to go! He scored four goals in Miami's 7-1 blowout against CF Montreal, snapping the club's five-game

3:11winliski and pulling him into first place in the MLS Golden Boot Race. In other Messy news this week, the Argentine announced on Instagram that he would be retiring from the international game. Quote, it was a decision that hurt and still hurts deep down, but I understand that the time has come. I swear to you that I always gave it my all, not just in these last few years when we won everything, but before that too, I always fought and left everything on the field for this jersey, to bring you joy and make you feel proud to be Argentine through football. It's rare these days that football gives us with something new, a new story, a new set of circumstances, characters or ideas. Everything is a remix, twist on an old trick, a rerelease, a repeat. But something new is happening in London, in a southeast corner of the city, an independent women's soccer club with no ties to a major men's team, just signed arguably the best player in the

4:16world and has the potential to redefine the women's game in 2026. London City line-assists, the first fully independent professional women's club will be playing in the top flight next season. London City line-assists, I think it's fair to say, went for it in their first season in the WSL, are they going for even more second time rounds? London City line-assists pulled off the deal of the century. I think they're going to look at that and think we want to win some silverware this season. It's a lot to look forward to this season, it really is going to be one of the big stories. This is a story of Michelle Kang, Alexia Poteas and building English women's soccer's first independent super club, the London City line-assists. It's taken three years, but the first ever semi-professional women's league in this country is finally here. The FA Women's Super League kicks off with Chelsea against Arsenal.

5:17It's been a long time in planning, a great deal of anticipation. Chelsea finally get the new FA Women's Super League underway at the hub. That's from the first ever WSL match in 2011 between Chelsea and Arsenal. The match was held at Chelsea Imperial Fields with an attendance of about 2500 people. While the setting was small in sparse, the day was filled with a gentle hope and optimism. But that scene 15 years ago with its smattering of fans, the match played in a stadium currently home to a club called Tuting and Mitchem is a far cry from what the WSL has become. The Women's Super League is now considered one of the top women's professional leagues in the world,

6:25rivaling the national women's soccer league, home to international talent like Buny Shah, Viv Metema and American stars like Naomi Gurma, Alyssa Thompson and Sam Koffee. Despite the WSL status as one of, if not the best league in the world, the WSL offers several things that the WSL cannot. Personally, I think it's always been end-of-ersale versus end-of-ersale. I don't think any leagues around the world even come close. That's Flow Lloyd Hughes, a football journalist and broadcaster based in the UK. But obviously it's been a big challenge for the end-of-ersale recently around salary cap about how they hold on to talent because without the salary cap and the WSL clubs were able to offer players a lot more. And also Chameleon Football I think does is a big sell to a lot of players. Which is how we get to London City. Yes, a London sea lioness is the only independent women's football side in the WSL. Now what that means is they are not attached to a

7:30men's side who often kind of exist as a parakeet club. They were promoted to the WSL last season, since their second season in the WSL. They are owned by Michelle Kang. You've heard of Michelle Kang. The money and motivation behind two of women's football's biggest projects, the Washington Spirit and Olympic Leonaise. Michelle Kang is the face of modern ambitious investment in the women's game. Kang's philosophy is clear and simple. Treat women's sports less like a charity case and more like a business. That means invest in success and demand results. We can get there so that this game does not need any outside validation. We stop comparing ourselves against any other sport especially men's game. And we stop following men's formula but build our own. And we're going to get there to get the attention and also the share of the investment dollars that are going into sports.

8:34She bought London City at the end of 2023 and has put that philosophy into practice over the past two seasons, making big time player purchases including Spanish star Mopi Leon, former England international goalkeeper Mary Erbs and French forward Hadidiyatu Dianne, Kang likes to let her business moves do the talking. And there was no louder statement of intent for London City than signing Alexia Poteas. I've been watching. Watching a club with no interest in following the path that's already been written. A club with the courage to write the song. A club that believed the best stick and that's where I'm here. Because the future is in some way to arrive. It's something you create. And right now all eyes are on London City. It's massive for the league to be signing one of the biggest women's footballers of all time. You know two ballendors, someone who is a world cup winner,

9:37multiple champions lead titles and is very much you know has been the face of women's football along with all the big stars in the global game recently. So it's huge for the league to have her. It's very exciting for all of us as women's football fans to be able to get to see her in the league. And it's you know certainly a sign of the double sales global appeal. Obviously you know Michelle Kang has the resource to be offering pretty nice salaries to these players. So it's not just that these players are coming because I think the double sales great. They're obviously getting paid very well for their for their time. But I think you know outside of that it's obviously really exciting. While investment is often celebrated in the United States, seen as a sign of belief of ambition and an intent to grow, it's met with much more skepticism and distrust in the United Kingdom. Partially because of the sticky issue of multi club ownership. In Europe we have had huge issues around multi club ownership about how it is kind of used and abused to funnel talent

10:42around sides and get around financial fair play regulations. So I do think it stems it stems from that and it stems through a natural kind of you know suspiciousness that English footballers had to deal with because billionaires and millionaires come and go you know they they asset strip they appear they disappear and English football fans are suspicious of you know those big owners coming in because so often it does damage the community assets that are our football club. So I do think that's more the resistance than anything. I think there are certainly people within the women's game who really admire and are excited about what she's building and respect her. But I do think there's that natural pushback around who owns our football clubs and what they're doing and I think that's a cultural thing. I think there is less suspicion around sports franchise owners in the US. English football fans have been burnt so much. We only recently just went through the super league proposal, the FIFA proposal to try and sell off private stakes in the World Cup.

11:49You know football fans are constantly dealing with attempts to change the game and things are out of their hands. So I do think there's natural questions around potential conflicts of interest that might arise with any football club owner and Michelle Kang is in the loan and that you know Todd Boley at Chelsea's had similar questions around his ownership or investments in a ticket seller but being a Premier League owner like how does that that work. So I think it's a cultural thing more than anything. While London City will have the services of one of the world's best players at its disposal, it faces several unique challenges that other WSL clubs don't. The huge advantage that the WSL and other European women's leagues have is the legacy brands that their women's teams exist as part of. You know they've got the most famous renowned globally well-known football clubs in the world that they can exist as part of. So they get that ready-made cache and reputation and

12:54fan interest. So they London City have to work that much harder to pull in fans. They're also competing in a very busy London market where you know the vast majority of fans support Arsenal. Arsenal Stadium is located in a very easy to get to London area where there's a lot of young people move there in London. A lot of queer people live there in London so it makes supporting Arsenal a very attractive prospect. London City have a challenge the fact that they are based in Bromley which is really kind of in Kent not in London. They ground share with a EFL side Bromley who have done a fantastic job really on creating a great small EFL stadium but it's not Sanford Bridge. It's not the Emirates you know like it does a great job at serving the local community but it doesn't quite have the lure and the aura of those stadiums I just mentioned so that's the challenge it makes that sort of things that much harder. And those are just the off-field issues. On the field there's

13:59always a risk that bringing in a lot of talent can cross the line into too much talent. There's a risk that you become a sort of rheumatoid galactico is where you've got a bunch of superstars that you're trying to create some kind of identity for. You know they're very much trying to build their own little Barcelona in in Southeast London and that they've got a GM who's ex-bars and they've got coaches who are ex-bars they've got a Spanish football coach who developed his coaching in Spanish football academies but that takes a lot of time and also when you sign big players all those players want to play so you've got to manage all those big personalities also a challenge. London City's first game is this Friday against Manchester United. While it's a long season and there are a lot of unknowns for the London City lineuses one thing is for sure. It's going to be something new. That's going to do it for this week. Thank you so much for listening. We'll be back next week chatting South America with my good friend Nico

15:03Cantor. Can't wait for that. So guys make sure to subscribe to First Touch Weekly wherever you get your podcasts and of course tell your soccer loving friends. We'll see you next time.