Is Michele Kang’s multi-club ownership good for women’s soccer?
Full Time with Meg Linehan: A show about women's soccer
The Athletic
4.8 • 756 Ratings
🗓️ 4 June 2025
⏱️ 57 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
In the wake of Michele Kang transferring head coach Jonatan Giraldez between two clubs that she owns, the Washington Spirit and OL Lyonnes, the soccer world has begun to question whether multi-club ownership is a good thing for the women's game.
This week on Full Time, hosts Tamerra Griffin and Meg Linehan are joined by Aslit Pelit and Emily Olsen of The Athletic for an in-depth discussion into the world of multi-club ownership. What has multi-club ownership looked like in the men's game, and what things can be learned or avoided? How is the Giraldez transfer an inflection point? Why would it be different if a player transferred between affiliated clubs? Is there a pecking order between clubs in a multi-club model? Does the UEFA Women's Champions League still hold the most prestige?
PLUS: Tamerra and Meg give their thoughts on the USWNT's 4-0 win over Jamaica, and who impressed during the most recent FIFA international window. Including, their opinion on who the USWNT's starting front three should be while 'Triple Espresso' remains absent.
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Articles mentioned on the show:
Down to Business: Multi-club ownership is growing in women’s soccer, but ‘execution is everything’
Spirit owner Michele Kang sets vision for future of women’s soccer with new global football group
FAQs about the Spirit’s coaching shuffle
Joe Montemurro leaves role as OL Lyonnes head coach
Spirit coach Jonatan Giráldez to take OL Lyonnes job, Adrián González to lead Washington
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HOSTS: Tamerra Griffin, Meg Linehan
GUESTS: Asli Pelit, Emily Olsen
PRODUCER: Theo Lloyd-Hughes
VIDEO PRODUCER: Lia Griffin
EXECUTIVE PRODUCER: Emily Olsen
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Hey, welcome to full-time presented by Amazon Business. |
| 0:15.7 | My name is Tamara Griffin, and ooh-wee! |
| 0:18.3 | It has been a week not only in the NWSL, but the wider world of global women's soccer. |
| 0:25.4 | Today, on this episode, we are talking mostly about the news that came out last week |
| 0:31.4 | that Washington Spirit owner Michelle Kang has transferred Washington Spirit head coach |
| 0:36.1 | Yona Heraldez to France. He is now going to be |
| 0:39.1 | the head coach of the now new outfitted O'L. Leon, formerly Olympic Leone. And that has prompted |
| 0:46.8 | a lot of questions, a lot of concerns. If you've not checked on your spirit friends now, is your |
| 0:51.9 | friendly reminder to do so because they've not been |
| 0:54.4 | okay and sort of understandably because in women's soccer we are entering this new-ish era of |
| 1:01.7 | multi-club ownership and we're going to be talking about that today not only with me and meg |
| 1:06.4 | but with a few other of our pals from the athletic women's soccer team, because there are so many |
| 1:11.9 | threads here. There's the business side. There's the club side. There's the fan experience side. There's |
| 1:16.4 | the player side. The sporting side. So many things that we're going to be brating together in this |
| 1:20.8 | conversation. And I'm really looking forward to all the different voices that we're bringing into this. |
| 1:25.1 | Namely, my co-host, Meg, Meg, how are you doing? Because you've |
| 1:29.3 | been reporting a lot of this. Yeah. I mean, it was a big weekend. Between that, I announced |
| 1:33.9 | some personal news with my wife as well, we're expecting late August. So it's been, yeah, |
| 1:40.5 | it was a real week across the port. I was also in New York City all day on Tuesday, partially why the show is late in addition to the U.S. Women's National theme. So, yeah, there's just, it's so much, so much is happening all the time. As always. Truly. And from the whole full-time family, congratulations. We are so excited to welcome this full-time baby to the family. It is going to be... |
| 2:05.7 | It is the year of soccer babies. Yes, truly. |
| 2:08.9 | 2025, it's you either have a baby or you go to Europe and I only had one of those two options. |
| 2:14.6 | You did, you got your Europe out of the way last summer with the Olympics so that you |
... |
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