St. Louis Athletica

Women’s Professional Soccer (2009-2010)

Background

First of all, thanks to Maire Ryan, a member of Athletica’s former Laclede’s Army supporters group, for contributing this rare scorecard (above) from the final days of the St. Louis Athletica women’s soccer club. Unfortunately, this May 8th, 2010 match against the Philadelphia Independence at Anheuser-Busch Soccer Park in Fenton, Missouri turned out to be the penultimate match in Athletica’s short, chaotic history.

Athletica formed in 2007 as part of St. Louis Soccer United (SLSU), an ambitious and ultimately doomed project to bring a Major League Soccer expansion franchise to the Gateway City. The man behind SLSU was a mesothelioma litigator named Jeff Cooper. Cooper had approval for an 18,500-seat soccer-specific stadium in suburban Collinsville, Illinois and envisioned an MLS club, top division women’s side, and a unification of St. Louis’s top youth clubs under a single umbrella.

MLS ultimately passed over St. Louis for expansion in 2008 and 2009. And SLSU never broke ground in Collinsville. But Cooper did launch the St. Louis Athletica women’s team in Women’s Professional Soccer (WPS) in 2009, engineer a merger of the city’s leading youth programs, and launched a 2nd division men’s pro side, AC St. Louis.

Assembling Athletica

Athletica was one of seven founding franchises in WPS. There were three key mechanism for each club to build its roster ahead of the league’s March 2009 debut: an allocation of U.S. National Team players, an international draft, and the college draft.

The U.S. National Team allocation was a matching process to distribute the top 21 American players among the 7 WPS clubs. Each WPS team identified the top three players it desired from the USWNT. Each of the top American players submitted a wish list of the top three cities in which they wished to play. League officials attempt to match desires as best as possible.

The trouble for St. Louis was that virtually no one on the USWNT listed the city among their top 3 destinations. One of the only exceptions was midfielder Lori Chalupny, a St. Louis native.  The team also received versatile defender Tina Ellertson. Athletica’s third and final allocation brought one of the biggest prizes available: National Team goalkeeper Hope Solo. Solo expressed no great desire to play in St. Louis – or anywhere else. Unlike the rest of her USWNT teammates, she let it be known that her allocation preference was up for bids. Whereas the league’s salary framework called for most USWNT players to earn around $40,000 for the 2009 season, Solo supposedly negotiated a six-figure deal with Athletica owner Jeff Cooper.

The International Draft brought Brazilian striker Daniela and Canadian forward Melissa Tancredi. Daniela’s former manager on the Brazilian National Team, Jorge Barcellos, signed on as Athletica’s head coach.

In the first round of the January 2009 WPS Draft, Athletic selected forward Kerri Hanks of Notre Dame. Hanks was a two-time winner of the Hermann Trophy as the NCAA’s top women’s soccer player.

2009 Season

2009 got off to a brutal start for Athletica. St. Louis failed to score in its first three matches. On May 3, 2009 Athletica travelled to Maryland to play the Washington Freedom for their fourth match. Daniela broke Athletica’s scoring drought with with 2 goals early in the match. But in the 80th minute, the Freedom’s Abby Wambach hit Daniela with a devastating slide tackle that cracked her tibia and tore her knee ligaments. The tackle effectively ended Daniela’s career.

Meanwhile, 1st round pick Kerri Hanks failed to adjust to the pro game. After 10 matchs, Hanks was shipped off to Sky Blue FC in a midseason trade. She would play just six more matches in her pro career.

And yet. The team got hot after Daniela’s injury. After an 0-2-2 start, Athletica went 10-4-2 the rest of the way to finish 2nd place in WPS. English National Team forward Eniola Aluko emerged to pick up the scoring slack from the departures of Daniela and Hanks.

In the playoff semi-final, Athletica hosted Sky Blue FC from New Jersey. Athletica owned Sky Blue during the regular season, winning all three of their meetings. But the visitors upset St. Louis 1-0 before a crowd of 5,064 at Anheuser-Busch Soccer Park, bringing Athletica’s debut season to a close.

2010 Season Collapse

Athletica returned for a second season in 2010. Meanwhile, St. Louis Soccer United’s men’s team, AC St. Louis, began their debut season in the 2nd division North American Soccer League.

The team played one more match at home on May 16th, before presumed club owner Jeff Cooper informed WPS officials that he could no longer make payroll and operate his team.  The news was startling and the reason was an even bigger stunner:  Cooper claimed he no longer owned the team.  It seems the St. Louis mesothelioma litigator quietly sold controlling interest in Athletica to Sanjay and Keemal Vaid, a pair of British commodities traders and Subway sandwich shop franchisees, in December 2009.  Cooper never informed the league of the change in ownership and continued to serve as his team’s front man and spokesman as he had since founding the club in 2007.  

Athletica shut down on May 27th and all of its players were rendered free agents.  Most of the top players signed with WPS’ remaining seven franchises.  Lindsay Tarpley headed to Boston and her U.S. Women’s National Team teammate Shannon Boxx went to FC Gold Pride, where she helped that Bay Area-based club win the 2010 WPS Cup.  Most of Athletica’s other stars signed with the last place Atlanta Beat, including Solo, St. Louis native Lori Chalupny, English National Team striker Eniola Aluko and stalwart defender Tina Ellertson.  WPS fans jokingly referred to the upgraded Beat side as “Atlantica” for the rest of the 2010 season.  For many of Athletica’s rookies and role players, there was nothing to laugh about.  Unable to generate interest and hook on with other clubs, their professional soccer careers simply came to abrupt end.

Voices

“When St. Louis went down mid-season — with absolutely NO warning – it shook the foundations of what we had all built.  It was technically survivable because we had independently owned franchises but it completely changed the willingness of investors to finalize investments that were long discussed — and not just in Chicago.  It rippled through the league and shut down some discussions that other franchises were having with investors and gave pause to some of the expansion candidates and potential sponsors to wait one more year to see how it all shook out.”

-Arnim Whisler, Chicago Red Stars Owner 2009-Present (Interviewed 2012)

Links

Women’s Professional Soccer Media Guides

Women’s Professional Soccer Programs

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