Fund independent journalism |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
05/08/2026
Continuity, chaos and Rodman: How Washington Spirit are thriving in NWSL
International talent and one of league’s most marketable players to fore as league approaches business end
|
|
|
|
|
| |
The National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) is just past the midway point of its 14th regular season, with 12 of 30 games remaining in the regular season (though half the league’s teams have one or more games in hand).
Despite a number of developments in 2026 – including two new expansion teams and the Utah Royals on a historic tear – some things have stayed consistent. At the moment, that includes a third consecutive season featuring the Washington Spirit as a top-two team. With the business end of the season looming, the mark of success is twofold: maintain that consistency through the end-of-year melee and into the playoffs (easier said than done) and, importantly for the Spirit, level up with a first-place finish in the table and/or a Championship trophy.
Continuity at the top doesn’t come easy in a league such as the NWSL. Over the years, the league has earned its reputation as a parity-based competition where – whether it be a weekend upset between teams at either end of the table, or a “worst-to-first” scenario from one season to the next – anything can happen. Teams have had years-long runs of dominant results. Most notably: the North Carolina Courage finished the regular season in first place for three consecutive seasons from 2017 to 2019, while also winning the NWSL Championship twice in that time. But over the course of 14 seasons the NWSL table has been famous for fluctuations.
Some early new trends have emerged in recent seasons. Teams such as Gotham, San Diego, Kansas City, Orlando and Washington have had a steady presence in the playoff spots (notable by NWSL standards), but their places in the top eight have varied, as has their success in the playoffs.
And yet while teams around them have had their highs and lows throughout the table (including a mercurial Gotham, one of three teams to beat Washington this season, who moved ahead of them into first place this Sunday) the Spirit have been, well, consistently good. And they’ve been good despite navigating myriad changes, including the departure of former NWSL Rookie of the Year Croix Bethune – who now plays for Kansas City – and two key starters in the run to the championship last season (Aubrey Kingsbury and Casey Krueger) on maternity leave.
|
|
|
 Croix Bethune, seen here surging away from Gotham FC’s Esther González, left Washington Spirit and joined Kansas City Current. Photograph: Reed Hoffmann/AP
|
“Turnover is normal in this league, so we do not take continuity for granted,” says Haley Carter, Washington’s president of soccer operations – a former player, coach and executive who most recently played a key role in Orlando Pride’s historic championship winning season in 2024.
Describing the importance of adding the right players to a strong foundation, Carter says: “We try to be thoughtful about who joins the club. When we sign a player or hire on the sporting side, fit is one of the first things we look at, because we are trying to build an environment and not just a roster.”
The Spirit have done a commendable job with talent identification in recent years, and have folded international talents from a large swath of countries into the spine of their team. Last June, Sofia Cantore became the first Italian in NWSL (she finished with four goals and one assist in 12 games, and has the same number this season). They also signed the league’s first Paraguayan, the 18-year-old Claudia Martínez, who has three goals in an impressive rookie campaign.
With the Women’s Africa Cup of Nations (Wafcon) ongoing, the Spirit have six players there representing Nigeria, Algeria, Côte d’Ivoire, Cameroon and Burkina Faso. (It’s a nod to the team’s depth that they’ve managed reasonably well without them.) Importantly, with Kingsbury out, the 28-year-old Scottish goalkeeper Sandy MacIver has stepped in with aplomb, setting a new team record for consecutive clean sheets (four) and has the fourth-best save percentage in the league.
Of course, in addition to the Spirit’s impressive cadre of international talents, one of NWSL’s most marketable names, Trinity Rodman, is pivotal to their past success and ongoing hopes of winning more trophies. Rodman’s 13 goal contributions in 18 games are the team’s most amid an in-form season. Her ability to press a backline, create space, take on defenders and link up with teammates such as Cantore or the Colombian midfielder Leicy Santos has been inseparable from this year’s consistency.
|
|
|
Trinity Rodman (centre) slots the ball past the Houston Dash keeper Jane Campbell to score one of her two goals in Washington Spirit’s 2-1 victory in July. Photograph: Scott Taetsch/NWSL/Getty Images
|
With interest from abroad, Rodman’s contract was so important to the team and league that (with the investment-happy support of the team owner, Michele Kang) the NWSL created a new “high impact player” policy to help keep her stateside. The so-called Rodman Rule allows teams to spend $1m outside the standard salary cap for players who meet certain criteria.
Kang, who has made news in recent weeks because of a $400m lawsuit with John Textor, is one of the most well-known figures in women’s football, as the owner of three clubs in three countries (the Spirit, OL Lyonnes and London City Lionesses). According to Carter, collaboration among the trio is indeed under way. It is “one of the most exciting parts of what we are building” and “is more structured than people might assume”.
Rather than re-invent the wheel, the three clubs collaborate across medical, performance and technical departments, and use “shared themes, shared processes, and increasingly shared software platforms for talent identification, performance management, athlete wellness, and operational efficiency”.
While things are looking bright for the Spirit at the moment, the remainder of the regular season and the playoffs just beyond will be the final proving ground for the theme of their season thus far: despite changes and good old NWSL chaos, the Spirit can be reliably good.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Talking points
|
Crunch time Wafcon wraps up the group stage on Thursday with the quarter-finals starting on Saturday in Morocco. The four winners of that round will qualify automatically for the 2027 World Cup in Brazil; the four teams who lose this weekend will face off to determine two berths in the intercontinental playoffs. At the time of writing, Cameroon, Morocco and Algeria have already qualified for the knockout stage.
|
|
|
Ibtissam Jraïdi scored twice in Morocco’s 4-0 win against Kenya in the hosts’ opening game. Photograph: Jalal Morchidi/EPA
|
Parting of ways Manchester United and head coach Marc Skinner announced a mutual agreement to part ways on Monday ahead of the new WSL season. The departure (which comes after five years in the role and a history of mixed reviews among the fanbase, despite qualifying for four finals) has reinvigorated a longstanding conversation regarding the storied club’s underinvestment in their women’s team – an issue voiced by Skinner as well as their former head coach, England national team veteran and Canada manager, Casey Stoney.
Infatino’s U-turn Last Friday evening, Gianni Infantino announced (amid escalating pressure, which included Uefa’ promise to boycott and statements of condemnation from the Asian Football Confederation and Concacaf) that the plan to sell private stakes in Fifa’s events would not move forward. With the Under-20 Women’s World Cup looming this September, the Under-17 World Cup and World Cup qualifying to follow, and the 2027 Women’s World Cup less than a year out, the world of women’s football avoided potentially severe implications for their biggest events.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Quote of the week
|
“The special thing is simple. These players have been together for almost four years. With the Chawingas participating, sometimes, maybe when they are busy with their clubs. The players, they gel together. They’ve been playing together.” The Malawi head coach, Lovermore Fizili, reflecting on a successful start to Wafcon for the debutants, who have beaten Nigeria and Egypt
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Recommended viewing
|
Two-time NWSL MVP Temwa Chawinga is appearing in her first Wafcon for Malawi, who stunned the reigning champions Nigeria in their first game. Chawinga scored her third against Egypt over the weekend.
|
|
|
| |
Our journalism is free to say what it wants… but worth paying for. |
From breaking news to huge investigative projects; from masterfully told features and long reads to reviews, podcasts, videos, lifestyle advice and much more. It’s an incredible amount of valuable journalism, and it costs a lot of money to produce. However, we keep our website free to read because we believe access to quality news is a global public good: a positive force for the health of democracy around the world.
For more than 200 years, we’ve been publishing fearless, independent journalism. Now, with a daily readership in the millions, we can bring vital reporting to people all around the world, including newsletters like this, direct to your inbox.
If you’ve been enjoying the Guardian’s independent journalism since signing up, please consider helping to fund our work. The most impactful way to do so is on a monthly basis from $5.
Thank you for reading, we hope you continue to enjoy the Guardian’s journalism.
|
|
|
|
|
|
| |
|
|
|
