Angel City FC fined by NWSL for announcing Christen Press signing too soon

The NWSL had a rather unusual announcement on Thursday, issuing 2022 expansion club Angel City FC an undisclosed fine for announcing a player’s signing before a deal was fully complete, and also “ignoring a league directive regarding the announcement.”

The player in question, of course, is Christen Press, who was announced as Angel City FC’s first player a week ago last Monday. That was the same day the club announced the inaugural head coach, Freya Coombe, and admittedly, it did feel a bit odd to drop two enormous pieces of news for an expansion club on the same exact day.

It appears what happened is that Angel City acquired Press’ NWSL player rights in a trade from Louisville City that was approved by the league, with both clubs announcing it on the day she was announced as an ACFC player by the club fully. I gather that Press has agreed to personal terms with the club, but because the league may not have gotten a signed contract in hand, they thought Angel City jumped the gun. Also, the league may have told them something like “Announce it on Tuesday,” and they got so excited they did it early. I don’t know how much the fine was but I imagine it was probably a pretty light sanction, a “Don’t do this again” directive.

Does this matter very much in the grand scheme of things? Not at all, honestly, it’s a little bit funny. But, something to keep in mind as Angel City works on future player announcements, which will likely come with the league fully looped in moving forward.

What do you think? Leave a comment below.