WSL and Championship agree to new club-owned structure

Women's Super League and Women's Championship teams have agreed to form a new club-owned organisation that takes control away from the FA.

The new organisation — named NewCo — will be an independent body that sees every club in the top two tiers act as shareholders. 

It will come into effect from the start of the 2024-25 season.

The change represents a significant moment in women's football in the UK, with the FA running the WSL since it was formed in 2010.

Former Nike director Nikki Doucet has been named as NewCo's chief executive and will immediately get to work on plans to move all 24 clubs into the new governance structure.

Doucet said: "This is an incredibly exciting time for women's football and I'm delighted to be appointed as the new CEO of the Women's Super League and Women's Championship.

"Having already worked with the clubs and the FA for a number of months, I've been incredibly encouraged by the collective desire and shared ambition to make our leagues the most distinctive, competitive and entertaining women's club competitions in the world.

"It's a great privilege to help lead the next phase of this inspirational journey, which has been started by the FA through passion, investment and a steadfast commitment to the evolution of women's football. 

"Together, we now have an opportunity to see further transformational growth across our leagues by maximising the unique qualities, values and principles that we see in the women's game and keeping the players and the fans at the heart of everything we do."

Director of women's football for the FA Sue Campbell added: "The women's professional game is in the strongest place that it has ever been thanks to the hard work of everybody involved in its development so far. 

"But we firmly believe that the NewCo will take it to another level entirely. 

"Each of our 24 clubs and the league itself wants the WSL and Championship to be setting the standards for women's football around the world and this venture into a new governing body is the next step in us achieving that ambition."