Michele Kang stays busy.
When she’s not acquiring women’s soccer clubs to add to her portfolio, she speaks at summits on the global game and hosts international clubs at the Washington Spirit. Kang has put leagues in multiple countries in conversation with each other, from the Spirit to London City Lionesses to the venerable Lyon in France. She’s seen the writing on the wall, which says to invest now before it’s too late — and be willing to think global as seen in the recent U.S. tours by Arsenal and Chelsea that included a stop in DC.
When Kang first bought into NWSL as a primary owner, her $35 million (£26.5m) takeover of the Spirit was seen as a blockbuster financial move compared to the $5 million purchase of the Kansas City Current and the approximate $2 million original entry fee for the Utah Royals. The price wasn’t necessarily an objective valuation, coming after months of increasingly acrimonious negotiation with former co-owners Steve Baldwin and Bill Lynch, who drove up the initial asking price from $21 million.
Still, it was a turning point in the valuation of NWSL teams, a rubicon from which there is no going back barring some unforeseen disaster. The NWSL is part of a booming global women’s soccer market as multiple leagues build audiences and each successive Women’s World Cup outgrows the last. The latest NWSL collective bargaining agreement only strengthens teams’ ability to participate in this market by eliminating restrictive practices such as limiting free agency or allowing teams to claim player rights through discovery claims.
That made it all the more intriguing to see the Spirit and Gotham FC host two of the most recognizable and successful English women’s teams this summer. Arsenal and Chelsea played one game against the Spirit and Gotham respectively, and then played a preseason exhibition game against each other at Audi Field as part of a doubleheader with the Spirit versus the Kansas City Current. Total attendance was 17,130 at the 20,000-seat stadium.
Before the game, the coaches from both teams, Arsenal’s Jonas Eidevall and Chelsea’s Sonia Bompastor, spoke about the importance of building their fanbases and experiencing what women’s sports are like in other markets. While these games were a way for Arsenal and Chelsea to play mid-season teams as part of their preparation for the 2024-25 season, it was the fanbase growth that seemed front of mind for all parties.
Arsenal, Spirit and Chelsea held a joint press conference ahead of friendly games. (Photo by Harriet Lande, Getty Images)
“It was very good for us to see how it goes here in the U.S.,” said Bompastor. “I know how much sport is important here in the U.S., and being able to go to a (New York Liberty) game was something very special.”
“I think it’s really important to grow an already big fanbase,” said Eidevall. “Supporters over here in North America, it’s great to connect with them and, of course, making it available for them to see us play live and to meet the players strengthens the bonds. And I think that bond between the team and the supporters is really important.”
The matchups were also good tests for NWSL teams returning to regular-season play after the Olympics. Players got to set up against different tactics and see opponents with different styles of play.
“I think it is good for us, for the NWSL teams like the Spirit to experience what it’s like to play other teams, other best teams in Europe, so we can learn from each other,” Kang told The Athletic.
“But also equally important is our fans. I want them to see in real-time, right in front of them, Chelsea and Arsenal. Even if you live in London, it’s very hard to go see that particular game. But I’m bringing them here because I want (fans) to see what — especially England being one of the major soccer leagues and countries — do they have? How do they play a game? So this is really about developing the sport and fan engagement and experience.”
For Chelsea and Arsenal, it was clear that they regard the U.S. as an important growth market. They carry prominent American players on their rosters — Catarina Macario, Mia Fishel, Emily Fox — but also feature popular international players such as Leah Williamson, Alessia Russo, Lucy Bronze, and Lauren James who all have their own burgeoning American fanbases.
Besides playing exhibition games against Gotham and the Spirit, both teams went on whirlwind tours of New York and D.C. Chelsea was courtside at the Liberty game to receive Ellie stomps from the team’s mascot and opened the New York Stock Exchange. Meanwhile, Arsenal hung out at Washington Mystics practice, exchanged jerseys at a Washington Nationals baseball game and stopped for local charity DC Scores.
Arsenal’s Leah Williamson and Kim Little swap shirts with Jose Ferrer of the Washington Nationals. (Photo by David Price, Getty Images)
“Our women’s team’s first pre-season tour here in the U.S. is another step forward for our club, the next chapter in our 37-year story,” Arsenal chief commercial officer Juliet Slot said in a team statement.
“We’ve seen extraordinary growth in recent years across the game. Last season, our average attendance was up 93% on 2022/23 across all our home games, and 11% up across our Emirates matches… We’re here in Washington to continue this journey, to connect with more supporters of the women’s game around the world, and give ourselves the best possible preparation for another season of progress with Emirates Stadium as our team’s new main home.”
Kang is hopeful for future reciprocal tours, taking the Spirit on the road to show their style of soccer to European audiences and help build international brand awareness. It helps that she owns a couple of teams overseas, including the massively popular Lyon. Right now, it’s just a hope for next season, but it was certainly a part of her thinking in helping to organize the Arsenal and Chelsea visit in the first place.
“I had conversations with other teams as well — but (with) those teams, we could not make the schedule work because of the Olympics, especially those countries that made the Olympics,” Kang said.
“The player availability was a challenge. And the NWSL regular season re-starts on (August) 19th, and the Olympics ended on the 10th, so that was a challenge. But we have absolutely had conversations about reciprocal (visits). One year they’ll come and play in DC, and the next year maybe we’ll go in another country, England or France and other countries.”
Exhibition games aren’t the end of Kang’s ambitions to take advantage of inter-club communication or international influence. In July, she announced the launch of the Kynisca Innovation Hub alongside Kynisca itself, which is how Kang is billing the umbrella organization through which she now owns multiple clubs. The hub is meant to gather data on female athletes — not just soccer players — and through partnerships with various universities, power research on training in women’s sports. Eventually, she hopes to be able to provide that data — properly anonymized — for anyone who wants to use it, from trainers to companies that manufacture sports equipment.
This, too, ties into growing the market while reflecting the current reality of most women’s soccer teams. There’s a massive dearth of research specific to female athletes and how they train; a 2023 report in the American Journal of Sports Medicine found that, of 669 studies over four years from six top sports medicine journals, only 8.8% focused solely on female athletes.
While rich and established men’s teams can afford to set up all the training and research they need in-house, Kang sees it as a necessity right now for women’s teams to share resources and pool information.
“It’s not a luxury or greed,” she said of purchasing multiple clubs. “It’s a necessity because each team just can’t do any kind of (research and development) and investment if you’re just one team.
“How are you going to invest? It’s a chicken and egg question. This is not any different than any Silicon Valley companies, where they have to put in a lot of money before they know where the first customer is going to come from.”
That makes it even smarter to build diplomatic relationships with other top clubs. For now, Kang has footholds in France and England; in the future, she’s looking to all the footballing regions, including South American and African leagues. The era when a prospective owner could buy in for relatively little money and come out the other end with a massive return on investment is ending. Kang pointed at NWSL’s skyrocketing valuations, from $5 million to $250 million in just a few years.
“I’m hoping that I can be a catalyst to encourage more people, especially more women, to invest in women’s football. I’ll be very happy to play that role,” she said of other potential investors. But she also had a simple piece of advice: “Don’t wait too long.”
(Top photo: Geoff Burke, Jessica Rapfogel/USA TODAY Sports)
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