A First Look at WPS

I always enjoy seeing one of my former players in action, and last Sunday at Toyota Park outside Chicago I had that opportunity and at the same time take my first look at the new Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) league.

It was a meaningless game between the Chicago Red Stars, who have been eliminated from the play-offs, and the first place Los Angeles Sol, but it had to be encouraging to the Red Stars and the league to have a season-high crowd of 7,959 at 20,000 seat Toyota Park. For me it was an added bonus to see former Medford Striker Carli Lloyd score the Stars’ first goal enroute to a 3-1 win.

In the 24th minute Lloyd controlled the ball in the center of the field, sent a ball to fellow National Team player Lindsay Tarpley, then ran ballside of her defender and took a perfect return pass from Tarpley and drilled it inside the left post. Tarpley gave Chicago a two goal advantage two minutes after halftime but L.A. made things interesting when Han Duan scored in the 9th minute with three minutes of stoppage time to come. But a minute later Cristiane sealed the result with a shot from the 18.

The post-game press conference was a non-event with both coaches calling it an “entertaining game” but saying nothing of substance and the media not asking any questions of substance. Each team has one more regular season match, then L.A. was off to the play-offs and Chicago was finished

But the story here was not the Los Angeles – Chicago game, but rather the bigger picture, the start of what I hope to be a year long fact-finding mission to see if women’s soccer can make it as a professional sport in this country. Or for that matter if men’s soccer can.

Sunday’s game offered some hope.

The match itself was in fact entertaining and generally well-played, but not as fast or as skilled as I recalled the Women’s United Soccer Association (WUSA). Too many missed traps and errant passes. back with the WUSA I watched the Philadelphia Charge play three seasons at Villanova Stadium before the league folded in 2003. It took until 2009 for WPS to rise from the ashes of WUSA.

Chicago has the advantage, as will the Philadelphia Independence next year, of playing in a beautiful soccer-specific stadium. Unlike Philadelphia’s venue, which will be off I-95 and easily accessible from Center City as well as the New Jersey and Pennsylvania suburbs, Toyota Park in Bridgeview south of the city is difficult to reach and nowhere near public transit.

Media coverage will be important and the Red Stars do a first rate job there – media relations coordinator Rob Coons is a personable host to the members of the media, be it bloggers like me, broadcasters or the daily press. The media guide and game day stat sheet are excellent. But the day following the game one Chicago paper I checked had nothing and another a small staff-written story.

Chicago averaged 4,591 through its first nine home dates, a figure that shot up to about 4,900 after Sunday’s crowd. Coons said the numbers had improved each of the last five games and attributed the large attendance for the last game to several factors, including good weather, but perhaps more importantly, the presence of Brazil’s Marta on the L.A. roster. Although she did not score in this game, Marta always has the potential to break open a game.

I’m hoping the powers that be in WPS are in this for the long haul. With good marketing and media relations to go with the soccer-only venues, the league can grow, but it will take time.

Stay tuned.