WSL’S CHANGING OF THE SEASONS – Kelly Simmons

At the media briefing to unveil FA WSL’s new format going into 2017, Kelly Simmons (FA Football Participation & Development Director), Baroness Sue Campbell (FA Head of Women’s Football), Mark Sampson (England Women’s Head Coach) and Katie Brazier (FA Head of Women’s Leagues & Competitions) were all present.

See the NEWS STORY for the full details of the Spring Series and new league, plus the FAQs about why the league will undergo this transition and some of the issues that reverting to a winter format will look to resolve.

We want to share some of the honest views we heard from some of the people who are responsible for the season shift with you, to hopefully add a little extra insight.
We spoke to Katie Brazier which you can read HERE and we also had an interesting chat with Kelly Simmons MBE about the changes too. (We were joined by Lindsey Hooper (Offside Rule Podcast), hence the LH questions.) Here’s what Kelly had to say…

SK: Was the summer league ‘experiment’ a success? (This question is a slightly cheeky one.)

KS: It’s a fair question. We set out in 2011 with a summer league and now we’re changing it so, what has changed between the decision originally, versus now? I think back to where women’s football was when we were planning that back in 2009, the structures were grassroots and I don’t mean that disrespectfully because the quality wasn’t grassroots. They were running on extremely small budgets, with next to no fan base, non-contracted amateur players, run by volunteers and we had to do something completely different. Playing it across the summer caught attention, club licensing was a massive change, opening it up and allowing clubs to apply was quite controversial. It was at a level where it needed something quite transformational to move the game on.  
I think we’re in a totally different place now, we ran it for six years, we’ve had some really good parts, some challenges. Everyone knows that our fixture calendar is a massive challenge, we’re also running out years in which to promote from the winter pyramid to the summer. We can’t have a closed pyramid and it’s not good for the game, so it’s got to the point where there’s two things we had to fix to move the game on and we think moving it back now, because it is a well-known brand now, it’s got a fanbase and broadcast partners say it’s strong enough to stand against the men’s game (and even now it hardly has a weekend where it doesn’t go up against men’s football, for example Katie said I think with we ran a 2017 summer season only three fixture windows didn’t go up against some men’s football), so the benefits outweigh the negatives in terms of moving it back.

LH: Has the success of the Lionesses and a growing fan-base following the world cup success wanting to watch women’s games and their favourites players play more regularly, spurred you on to implement these changes more quickly?

KS: I don’t know if it’s spurred us on to do it any quicker, we were always thinking with the new strategy coming out this year which will replace ‘Game Changer’ we knew it was a big nut to crack and we’ve been talking about it internally for some time. Obviously we consulted clubs we had to work out the mechanics of it. We have a women’s strategy group internally where the technical department, competitions department etc come together every month to discuss the best things for the game, like how do we make the league better, how do we support England winning. It quickly came up that this is a major issue, the league running across the summer, that we have to crack and when you start to delve into it and block out the things you can’t change (you can’t change FIFA windows, your tournaments are when tournaments are, if you’re going to get U19s released for tournaments and finals they are where they are and the Uefa Women’s Champions League is not going to change) you start to think there maybe needs to be a different way to do this.

SK: Was this decision made on the back of a growing tide of realising that this needs to be done?

KS: Well for the last three or four years we have been in negotiation with the Women’s Premier League. Initially we went in to talk to them about the issues they had got with the women’s Super League, when it was a closed league. And we suggested to them an interim solution which was the promotion. We’d allow the winning clubs to come through but we know it’s a short term gap, so even from two-three years ago we were saying in front of the WPL clubs that either the WSL would have to move in line with the pyramid or rest of the pyramid will have to move in line with the WSL, it’s not sustainable. Promotion is not ideal because there is a big gap for that club, relegation (from WSL2) you might as well just fold the club. Who is going to be relegated in November and wait until next September to play?

(Kelly Simmons speaks at the media launch for the FAWSL 2016 season at SGP)

SK: Now that you will operating promotion and relegation, are there potentially going to be teams that can’t fulfil the criteria and provide the resources you need to play at a certain level (or struggle miving up and down) or will those demands be relaxed?

KS: WSL1 and 2 the clubs have to meet licensing criteria. At the moment in the WPL it is predominantly ground grading but I do think we need to look at longer term licensing piece throughout the pyramid. This is an exaggeration but we can’t expect clubs to go from requiring ‘a roped off pitch’ to something much bigger, so over a period of time we do need to look through the pyramid and in consultation with the clubs, like they have done in men’s football, for example with licensing in the Alliance where they are trying to gradually move clubs on with a stepped change. I think it’s really important that we hold strong to the club licensing criteria. For me, that’s been more transformational than running a summer season.
 

SK: Have you had any feedback from your European colleagues about the WSL and the reverting back to winter, are they envious, do they think it brave?

KS: We’ve got a great relationship with the top European women’s leagues and the federations running women’s football and we meet quite regularly to share best practice around our elite leagues, so we’re constantly in touch with Germany and France and Sweden and so on. When we have challenges, we’re exchanging emails. But obviously we’re watching them, they’re watching us and trying to learn from them. Same with the States, even though it’s a totally different set up. But there’s a view that the WSL has moved in terms of quality and profile, quite dramatically and quickly, so they are looking at what is going on here, definitely. And with England as well, getting the Bronze last summer, they see England are starting to punch their weight and people want to know what’s going on, what are you doing?

SK: Can you yourself believe how far the women’s game has come in the past decade?

KS: Yeah, it’s been phenomenal. Even just the last couple of years. The WSL seems to be flourishing and obviously England’s success in Canada really, that highlighted all of the work in the women’s game that has got the England team to be where it is. So the players, being professional footballers playing in a good league, the profile of the game, the Talent Pathway that they’ve come through etc. So it is great but I’m the sort of person that spends the whole time looking at things we haven’t done yet, looking forward the whole time!

LH: Do you feel happy/fortunate being in the position – unlike in the men’s game – to be in control of a league that can work with and for the England team, to give them the best possible chance to win the world cup in 2023?

KS: Well our starting point for all of our strategy is ‘England Winning’ because if England do well that has a massive impact on all of the women’s game because that builds so much interest and awareness and support and we saw that with the spike in attendances when they came back. So the clubs know as well that England winning will really help them in terms of the knock on of them promoting women’s football. But we’ve got to balance that off with building and supporting a successful women’s league and supporting the clubs and I think that was one of the problems with the summer league, that it was stop-start, the clubs couldn’t get a run, then we’d break for England, want a camp for England to give them best preparation for a world cup or in this case the Euros. We have to work together. If we have a really strong WSL and England do well then I think everybody wins. The game wins.

SK: With 2023 being the tournament you have the goal for the team to win, could it be a goal for England to also host the competition?

KS: There’s no decision on it as yet and the drawback is that it is in France in 2019, so if The FA did decide to be would FIFA put it in England when there are other confederations it has never been in. But it would be fantastic, going forward, to host a major competition. But we should have the ambition to host it one day.

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