Kobbie Mainoo shows true colours with nine-word comment about Erik ten Hag’s last season​

Indiana Fever star Caitlin Clark is part of the ownership group trying to bring an NWSL expansion team to Cincinnati.

Cincinnati is one of a handful of finalists bidding for an NWSL expansion team that is expected to be awarded before the end of the year. The team would begin play in 2026, joining a previously announced expansion team in Boston to bring the NWSL to 16 teams.

“The NWSL Cincinnati bid team is thrilled that Caitlin Clark has joined our ownership group in pursuit of bringing a women’s professional soccer team to our city,” the NWSL Cincinnati bid team said in a statement to ESPN.

“Her passion for the sport, commitment to elevating women’s sports in and around the Greater Cincinnati region, and influence as an athlete and role model for women and girls around the world, make her a vital part of our compelling bid to become the 16th team in the NWSL.”

Clark was selected first in the WNBA draft this year by the Fever after breaking the NCAA scoring record at the University of Iowa. She won WNBA Rookie of the Year in 2024 and became the first rookie since Candace Parker in 2008 to make the All-WNBA First Team.

The ownership group of MLS team FC Cincinnati is leading the bid. Also in contention are groups from Cleveland, Denver, Nashville and Philadelphia. Cincinnati is considered one of the favorites in the process because of its ownership backing and existing infrastructure, sources told ESPN, with a stadium already purpose-built for soccer.

Cleveland, Denver and Philadelphia all hope to build stadiums and play in temporary venues upon launching in 2026 if their bid is accepted, multiple sources said.

The group in Cleveland, which multiple sources also consider to have a strong bid, recently announced that it acquired the downtown land on which it intends to build a stadium.

Multiple sources said the expansion fee for the 16th NWSL team could approach $100 million. Boston and Bay FC, which began play this year, each paid $53 million to enter the league after being selected in 2023.

The most recent process started earlier this year with about a dozen serious inquiries in the first stage of bidding.

Moments after scoring one of the most iconic goals in NWSL history in her team’s most important game to date, Orlando Pride forward Marta clutched her fist and unleashed a passionate scream before beating her chest and then, with her two thumbs, pointing to the famous No. 10 on the back of her purple jersey.

Even at 38, the six-time world player of the year was still the otherworldly star making defenders helplessly fall to the ground as she figuratively gestured: “Are you not entertained!?”

Marta was celebrating what turned out to be the winning goal of the top-seeded Pride’s 3-2 semifinal victory over the No. 4 seed Kansas City Current on Sunday at Inter&Co Stadium in Orlando to punctuate the most captivating semifinal playoff round the NWSL has seen.

Now, the two best teams in the league will square off in the final on Saturday in Kansas City, Missouri, where the Pride will face the No. 2-seeded Washington Spirit. Everything about this NWSL postseason has been entertaining — and deviated from the league’s unpredictable norm.

The higher seed has won every game of the playoffs, an obvious statistic in a vacuum but a shocking fact for a league whose unofficial brand is chaos. When Orlando and Washington meet on Saturday, it will mark the first time since 2019 that the top two seeds reached the final. It’s also the first time the Shield winner has made the final in five years.

Coming off historic parity in 2023 — a season in which first and last place were separated by only 13 points, and the No. 6 seed won the title — this year has been about the stars and the individual and team level. The top four teams were in a class of their own, with the fourth-place Kansas City Current finishing 16 points above the fifth-place North Carolina Courage. Orlando finished 40 points above the last-place Houston Dash.

All four top seeds advanced in the opening round of the playoffs, which led to an incredible semifinal round in which the margins were thin. Washington knocked out NJ/NY Gotham FC on Saturday in a penalty shootout thanks to the triple-save efforts of Spirit goalkeeper Aubrey Kingsbury. Orlando held on to survive a late Kansas City onslaught in 19 minutes of stoppage time.

Each of the weekend’s victors leaned into their strengths to prevail: The Spirit rallied for an equalizer in second-half stoppage time on a combination between two rookies — Makenna Morris and Hal Hershfelt — to claw back into a game late, as they have so many times this year.

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Aubrey Kingsbury makes three PK saves to send Spirit to NWSL final

Aubrey Kingsbury saves all three shots during penalty kicks to send the Washington Spirit to the NWSL final.

Orlando’s role players put in huge shifts — including unheralded Haley McCutcheon, who scored in her second straight playoff game — as Marta and star striker Barbra Banda scored memorable goals.

Speaking ahead of Sunday’s semifinal about what might separate two of the best teams the league has ever seen, Kansas City coach Vlatko Andonovski said the game probably would come down to a moment of brilliance. He was right — although it was moments, plural.

The same can now be said about Saturday’s championship, one that with no hyperbole might be the most anticipated in league history.

Orlando set a league points record (60) and both teams finished the regular season with 18 victories, also a league record. Both squads feature global stars, headlined by U.S. international forward Trinity Rodman for the Spirit, and each team has a ludicrous amount of roster depth.

The midfield battle will be a scrap, with Hershfelt patrolling from a deep area for the Spirit and McCutcheon and Angelina counteracting her for Orlando.

Banda — and, as she reminded the world again Sunday, Marta — can single-handedly change a game, but so too can Rodman, who delivered the winning assist in extra time as a rookie in the 2021 final, when the Spirit won their only trophy to date.

Wide areas could decide the winner Saturday, as they partly did throughout the semifinals. Both goals before the penalty shootout in the Gotham-Spirit semifinal came on the heels of individual brilliance on the flank.

The Pride gave up an early goal to Kansas City on Sunday in a transition moment that ended with Current forward Michelle Cooper getting to the endline on the right flank and crossing the ball to Debinha for the finish. Orlando quickly answered when McCutcheon redirected a cross from winger Ally Watt, who sized up Current rookie defender Ellie Wheeler one-on-one in the right channel.

Expect Saturday’s final to be a chess match between two of the best coaches in the league who each came to this moment on two wildly different roads.

Spirit head coach Jonatan Giráldez left the glory of Barcelona, which he led to the two most recent European crowns, to take on the challenge of the NWSL starting halfway through this season. He has pulled all the right strings even while dealing with mounting injuries, including season-ending issues for three starters.

Pride head coach Seb Hines played for Orlando’s MLS club before becoming an assistant through three different Pride coaching regimes. He took over as interim in 2022 as the Pride were at another low point and turned a hopeless club into a team that was difficult to beat and, for the first time in years, a place players wanted to be. Hines is stoic; Giráldez wears his heart on his sleeve — or at least did in a rowdy, chippy semifinal.

The Pride and Spirit were separated by only four points in the regular season. Orlando clinched the NWSL Shield in October with a 2-0 home victory over a Spirit team depleted by injuries (which were compounded by midfielder and captain Andi Sullivan tearing her ACL in that game). Marta made the difference on that day, too, scoring the winning goal from the penalty spot.

Afterward, she was reduced to tears as she celebrated her first U.S. domestic club trophy since winning the 2011 title in a now defunct league.

“I stayed here because I want to make history with this team,” Marta said after that Shield-clinching victory on Oct. 6. “And then we did tonight, and then we go for more.”

As Hines said after Sunday’s semifinal victory, the Pride and the Spirit were the two best teams this year and they deserve to be in the final. They each proved that again in the semifinals as they came from behind and leveraged every bit of depth and star power on their respective rosters.

On Saturday, they meet again in a heavyweight fight likely to be decided by a few moments of brilliance. If even a modicum of energy from the playoffs thus far is brought to that game, it guarantees to entertain.

KANSAS CITY, Missouri — Washington Spirit midfielder Croix Bethune capped off an incredible first year as a professional player with another award on Thursday when the 23-year-old was named the first recipient of the NWSL’s Midfielder of the Year, and told ESPN that she is only just getting started.

Bethune, who tied an NWSL record with 10 assists this season, was also named Rookie of the Year earlier this week. She earned her first cap for the United States this year and won an Olympic gold medal with the team in August.

Her season was cut short by a torn meniscus suffered while throwing out a celebratory first pitch in late August, meaning she won’t be on the field for the Spirit in Saturday’s NWSL Championship against the Orlando Pride.

Bethune said she hopes to start running again next week and return to the field for the start of the 2025 season.

“Of course, staying healthy, but building on this year,” she told ESPN about her future goals. “Having such a great rookie season, I feel like a lot of people might think it will be hard to top or do better, but for me, I feel like this is just the base to build off of that and to continue to elevate as a player.”

Bethune needed only 17 games to tie former USWNT great Tobin Heath’s NWSL assists record from 2016. Heath, a two-time World Cup winner, was one of Bethune’s favorite players growing up. Bethune said Heath congratulated her on her great season and agrees that there are similarities in their games.

“Tobin is so cheeky and creative, and she has great soccer IQ,” Bethune said. “I feel like there’s a lot of similarities and just watching her play was always so much fun.”

She continued: “For me, I’ve just been playing soccer for so long and I love it. I’ve been taken away from the game, and it helped me find love even more for the game, so I feel like when it’s time to play and perform, I’m just out there doing what I love, just having fun. I feel like I naturally go into a state of flow or calmness.”

Bethune joins USWNT defender Naomi Girma as the only first-year player to win NWSL Rookie of the Year in addition to another award. Girma was also named Defender of the Year as a rookie for the San Diego Wave in 2022.

Bethune described the year as “blessings on blessings,” although having it cut short by another injury, one that didn’t even occur during soccer activities, took some time to process.

“The first week or two were tough, especially coming to peace with what happened,” she said. “It happened and I can’t change anything about it. But after that, just the support being around and flipping my mentality like let’s put this work in to get back, it was fine after that.”

Bethune is one of 11 players this year to earn her first senior USWNT call-up under head coach Emma Hayes. She said she wrote down the Olympics as one of her goals at the beginning of 2024, despite being uncapped, and it manifested itself.

“I honestly love it,” Bethune said of the youth movement in the league and with the USWNT. “I think it’s showing that no matter what class or how old you are, if you’re a baller you’re a baller. I love that Emma’s giving us youth and the younger ones an opportunity to see what we can do. We definitely do have some OG ballers involved with the national team, but I love that she’s allowing us to show what we can do.”

She is also part of a Washington Spirit rookie class that has played a crucial role in the team’s championship run. Washington has continued its strong run of form despite missing Bethune this season.

The attacking midfielder is in Kansas City with the squad and will be cheering them on from the sidelines.

“I think what makes the team special is our grit, our determination to work hard, but also the trust we have within each other,” Bethune said. “I feel like from the beginning of the season, the exterior of our bubble, everyone else didn’t believe in us or think that we would get this far — especially having a new team and then a new coach come in. But I feel like we stuck together and stayed within our bubble to perform so well.”

Midfielder Julian Gressel said Lionel Messi demanded Inter Miami CF reach higher standards, going as far as to label ties throughout the season as “unacceptable.”

“It’s demanding [in the locker room with Messi]. You’re talking about the player with the most wins in the history of the game,” Gressel said on the “Major League Journeymen” podcast. “They’re coming in and they’re expecting the same, and you as a teammate, you kind of have to get accustomed to that and get used to that with Messi, [Luis] Suárez, [Sergio] Busquets and [Jordi] Alba.

“It’s unacceptable to tie a game, as simple as that. We tied a game earlier in the year and I remember him being really really upset in the locker room, he’s like, ‘We shouldn’t tie, we can’t tie.'”

Gressel said at one point in the season, then-manager Gerardo Martino tried to step in and calm Messi down, telling him: “It’s OK to draw sometimes, we can’t just win everything, it’s not how this league works.”

“But for [Messi], his aura is that,” Gressel added.

Inter Miami concluded the 2024 MLS campaign with the Supporters’ Shield and set the league record for most points in a single season before losing to Atlanta United FC in the first round of playoffs. Though the team managed a historic 22-4-8 (W-L-D) record, Gressel emphasized tension would rise inside the locker room after a negative result and lead Suárez to occasionally confront players about individual performances.

“When it comes to the game or when it comes to being serious, it’s being serious and it’s time,” Gressel said. “If you’re not doing your part, you’re getting it, like, you’re hearing it. You notice they’re not content. [Messi has] addressed other guys directly, he’s more so quiet, but you have guys like Luis, who’s a little bit more emotional. He’s more outgoing in a sense, emotionally outgoing like that, so you hear more from him.

“Messi will certainly come up to you and will talk to you more so rather than be in your face about things. So we definitely kind of see that demand.”

The Herons fell to Atlanta at Mercedes-Benz Stadium on Nov. 2 and Chase Stadium on Nov. 9 to see the 2024 campaign come to an end after a 2-1 loss in the teams’ best-of-three series, leaving many on Miami in a state of shock.

“After the loss, the guys were distraught in the locker room. You have everybody kind of staring into nothing,” Gressel said. “You just sit in the quiet and kind of in disbelief, but also very hesitant too, like, ‘Whoa, like, what just happened.'”

Gressel, however, said he could see “warning signs” that Inter Miami would struggle in the postseason before the eventual elimination during the third match. Though the team scored a league-high 79 goals throughout the season, the backline conceded 49.

“I saw some warning signs throughout the last few weeks of the season,” Gressel said. “All year long, we’ve given up too many chances and we’ve given up too many goals and that’s all usually something that you have to fix before the playoffs in order to kind of make a deep run.”

The team now heads into the offseason with the task of making 2024 roster decisions and finding a new coach after Martino announced his resignation on Nov. 19.