A Closer Examination of the Nadia Nadim acquisition by Travis Murphy

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Let me do a quick intro before I turn this post over to Travis. Until now, all of the posts on this site have been written by me. If all goes well, you will be seeing contributions from Travis and potentially others.

Michael Shaw - Fleur-de-lis-FC.com Editor

What went into Nadia Nadim’s signing with Racing Louisville?

Last week’s breaking news of Nadia Nadim’s signing with Racing Louisville was widely covered in the media. The club itself put out an excellent introductory video that clearly took some advance cooperation with Nadim. Several articles were prepared in advance for immediate publication that went through Nadim’s background for the fans unfamiliar with her. And the Racing coach, Christy Holly, was credited with contacting Nadim’s camp in January to initiate this entire process.

The true roots of the signing go back further than January, however. On October 26, last year, Racing acquired the organization’s first players in announcing a trade with the Chicago Red Stars. Racing received Savannah McCaskill, Yuki Nagasato, Chicago’s first-round pick in the upcoming college draft (number 5 overall) and an international player slot in 2021 and 2022 in return for full roster protection in the expansion draft. The first-round pick became Emina Ekic, but the international slot that was part of the deal was an afterthought until last week’s signing of Nadia Nadim.

What is an international player slot?

NWSL rules allow for each league team to have 4 international player slots on the roster in 2021. Put simply, any team signing an international player must have an empty international player slot before the league will approve the signing. These slots limit the amount of internationals, defined in the NWSL as non-US or Canadian, players on NWSL rosters at any given time. The slots themselves are tradeable assets and frequently are traded; there is no limit on the number of slots a given team may acquire or hold at the same time but there are only 40 slots available in 2021 spread across the 10 teams. Racing received an additional slot from the Chicago trade to bring their available slots up to 5, while Chicago’s slots decreased to 3 because of the trade.

Approaching the expansion draft with just 1 international player on the roster but 4 additional slots available surely played a role in who the front office chose in the draft. Ultimately, Racing selected 3 international players in the first 9 picks: Ghanaian Jennifer Cudjoe from Sky Blue FC with the 3rd pick and Australians Alanna Kennedy and Caitlin Foord from the Orlando Pride with the 6th and 9th picks. While the club has been silent regarding any negotiations with those three players, Racing was unable to sign any of the 3, ultimately trading Cudjoe back to Sky Blue for an additional 2nd round pick in the college draft.

Racing began the season with just 2 international players signed: Yuki Nagasato and Swedish midfielder Freja Olofsson, who signed with the club in December. Two additional signings came quickly at the beginning of the season: English defender Gemma Bonner signed in late April followed by English forward Ebony Salmon in early May. The 5th and final international slot was filled last week when Racing announced the signing of Nadia Nadim.

Chicago Red Stars trade recap

It’s always dangerous to evaluate the results of a trade so soon after it took place, and with so many games left in the season. That said, the Racing front office probably deserved an “A” grade at the time of the Red Stars trade that can now be upgraded to an “A+”. Both Nagasato and McCaskill have played every minute of regular season competition thus far for Racing, 2 of only 5 players to do so. Racing turned the 5th pick of the college draft they received from Chicago into Emina Ekic – who scored the winning goal in the club’s first ever NWSL win and who is also the marketing face of the club as the “Hometown Hero” Louisville native. Now Racing is set to debut Nadia Nadim using their 5th international slot – only possible due to this Chicago trade. Per the expansion draft rules, Racing was only permitted to select up to 2 players from Chicago. Yet the club executed a novel trade that produced 4 starters for them in 2021. Pretty safe to look back at this point and call this an “A+”.

Travis Murphy is a contributing Writer for Fleur-de-lis-FC.com.