rewrite this content and keep HTML tags
Photo provided by Amanda Vandervort.
USL Super League president Amanda Vandervort can’t shake the memory of the league’s inaugural match, a sellout crowd of 10,553 outside of Charlotte, North Carolina last August. The scenes, she said, were a proof of concept for the upstart U.S. women’s pro league trying to find a foothold.
“The first four, six months have been so exciting,” Vandervort said to The Equalizer. “It’s been amazing.”
That challenge was felt in the realities of the weeks and months that followed. The USL Super League resumed play this month after a winter break that marked the unofficial halfway point of its inaugural season. A fall-to-spring calendar is the league’s most unique trait, one that stands in contrast to the National Women’s Soccer League, the incumbent first-division league that began play in 2013.
But attendance has been a struggle.
D.C. Power averages 1,971 fans per game while Lexington SC averages 1,811. D.C. plays at Audi Field, also home to the Washington Spirit of the NWSL and D.C. United of Major League Soccer, which has a capacity of 20,000. Lexington features at Lexington SC Stadium, which holds 7,500 fans.
Access the best women’s soccer coverage all year long
Start your FREE, 7-day trial of The Equalizer Extra for industry-leading reporting and insight on the USWNT, NWSL and beyond.
