For the second straight day, the National Women’s Soccer League made a sponsorship announcement. This time around, it will impact player kits and pocketbooks. Ally, a digital financial-services company, joined the NWSL as a league-wide partner. Their logo will be featured as the sleeve sponsor on all NWSL jerseys for 2021.
From the league’s press release, which you can read here, commissioner Lisa Baird said: “Ally is the perfect fit for our league and I’m thrilled to welcome them to the NWSL family. The NWSL and Ally are game-changers in our respective industries and the opportunity to showcase our shared values and commitment to leveling the playing field is an extraordinarily unique proposition in the world of sports sponsorship.”
What’s different about this sponsorship is that a portion of Ally sponsorship fees will go back to the players themselves. The league’s salary structure ranges from a minimum of $22,000 to a maximum of $52,500. This doesn’t include allocated players from the United States and Canada who are paid by their nation’s soccer federations. There is no word yet on how that sponsorship money will be allocated to individual players.
Beyond kit sleeves and extra pay, the Ally partnership will include work in “Diversity, Equality and Inclusion initiatives” in team communities. NWSL players have a strong foothold in their communities, like Chicago defender Sarah Gorden’s nonprofit HoodSpace. Its goal is to empower girls of color through meditation, yoga, and sport.
Ally’s partnership is the second announced in just two days. They join Nationwide, which the league announced on Monday. Both partnerships stress an involvement with the communities around the NWSL.
The NWSL begins their 2021 season with the Challenge Cup on April 9. The inaugural match features last year’s Challenge Cup winners the Houston Dash facing off against the Chicago Red Stars.
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