If No. 1 draft choose Alyssa Thompson was essentially the most excited individual to listen to her title known as on NWSL draft night time, her new Angel Metropolis FC teammates might need been an in depth second.
“Christen [Press] texts me right this moment like, ‘Let me know after we’ve drafted gamers and I can attain out. I’m excited to have them on board,’” Angel Metropolis head coach Freya Coombe advised Simply Girls’s Sports activities on Thursday, an hour earlier than the Los Angeles membership secured the ahead of their future.
Thompson’s upside is sky excessive, together with her profession trajectory pushing ahead nearly as quick because the 18-year-old can run a 100-meter dash. There’s pure threat concerned in betting a major sum of money on a young person who’s unproven on the increased stage, however the NWSL has a robust current monitor file with its younger gamers, with 18-year-old Jaedyn Shaw thriving in San Diego and 17-year-old Olivia Moultrie making regular progress with the Portland Thorns. And Thompson already has expertise with the U.S. girls’s nationwide staff, incomes her first two caps final fall and making her debut at England’s Wembley Stadium.
Coombe feels Angel Metropolis has the locker-room tradition vital for Thompson to really feel supported and reside as much as her potential. To the coach, moments of development occur not solely in conversations off the sphere however in real-time conditions throughout video games.
“I feel our tradition has been completely sensible, and it’s led by our captain, Ali Riley, who’s completely sensible when it comes to how supportive she is,” Coombe stated.
“We’ve received gamers, the casual leaders that can seize any recreation by the scruff of the neck, like [Savannah McCaskill], and she or he’s like, ‘Let’s go,’ and she or he leaves it on the sphere. I feel that’s an effective way of defending the tradition, and I’m excited to carry younger gamers into such an important optimistic tradition in order that they’ll develop and flourish.”
For Thompson, who took within the draft with household and associates at a watch occasion in Los Angeles, Thursday introduced an emotional excessive. The SoCal native, although, had an even-keeled strategy to the night. Thompson is perhaps the NWSL’s latest star, however she’s additionally nonetheless ending her senior yr of highschool at Harvard-Westlake Prep.
“I’m like an ‘out of sight, out of thoughts’ individual,” she advised Simply Girls’s Sports activities. “So earlier than, I wasn’t actually excited about it that a lot. I used to be simply making an attempt to get by means of college as a result of I’ve a bunch of different distractions to maintain me busy.”
Rising up within the space, Thompson received an opportunity to expertise Angel Metropolis’s inaugural season first as a fan, and she or he says attending a match received her hooked on the membership.
“I feel a pair issues excite me [about Angel City], however one is simply the followers. I feel they’re the perfect within the NWSL,” she stated. “I went to a recreation they usually have been simply tremendous loud, nothing like I’ve ever seen earlier than in a lady’s recreation.”
The match between participant and membership might need felt destined, however Angel Metropolis had to surrender loads to lock up Thompson’s future in L.A. ACFC despatched a complete of $450,000 to 2 separate golf equipment as a part of a three-team commerce that secured Angel Metropolis the No. 1 choose within the 2023 draft, which they used on Thompson.
“It’s a credit score to Angela [Hucles] for with the ability to negotiate and pull off the commerce and transfer all of the chess items with a purpose to make it occur. So she did an important job,” stated Coombe, whereas acknowledging that the membership paid a worth for his or her prime draft alternative. “There’s all the time limitations if you’re working with a wage cap, roster caps, worldwide spot caps and every little thing. I feel it’s about prioritizing what you need. And that’s one thing that the membership has proven, that it is a precedence for us.”
Finally, Angel Metropolis was prepared to take an enormous swing to pick the participant they’d set their sights on and to proceed to set a monetary customary within the league.
“By way of salaries and every little thing, we have now to begin displaying our intent,” Coombe stated. “I feel the standard of the league, we’re attracting gamers when it comes to, they need to come and play within the stadiums which are packed out, they need to come and play at Angel Metropolis, they need to go to Kansas Metropolis, they need these environments.
“After which we’ve received to have the ability to pay the cash to match it.”
With the choose in and her rookie contract signed, Thompson can now deal with the duty at hand. That features starting to construct a relationship together with her future frontline associate and the participant she stated she’s most excited to play with at Angel Metropolis: Christen Press.
Claire Watkins is a Employees Author at Simply Girls’s Sports activities. Observe her on Twitter @ScoutRipley.