The NFL is ready to launch skilled flag soccer leagues for each women and men throughout the subsequent couple of years, NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell introduced on the Leaders in Sport convention in London’s Twickenham Stadium on Thursday, as first reported by the Related Press. The brand new leagues goal to debut forward of the 2028 Los Angeles Summer time Olympics, the place flag soccer will make its Olympic debut as an official sport. Goodell expressed optimism concerning the vital curiosity in establishing these leagues and highlighted the rising enthusiasm for flag soccer worldwide.
“We’re committed to creating a women’s professional league, and a men’s professional flag league,” Goodell stated. “We’ve had a great deal of interest in that and I expect that we’ll be able to do that, launch that, in the next couple of years.”
Goodell famous the fast development in flag-football participation at youth and collegiate ranges, underscoring efforts to create a structured pipeline ranging from youth leagues by highschool and school, finally reaching skilled play. “If you set that structure up where there’s youth leagues, going into high school, into college and then professional, I think you can develop a system of scale. That’s an important infrastructure that we need to create,” Goodell stated.
A brand new future for soccer?
Flag soccer has surged in recognition as a non-contact, gender-inclusive model of American soccer. USA Soccer stories youth flag soccer participation has elevated dramatically in recent times, with practically 1.6 million athletes ages 6 to 17 enjoying the game within the U.S. in 2023 alone. The game is very distinguished amongst women and girls, in keeping with the the Nationwide Governing Physique for American Soccer within the U.S., contributing to requires expanded skilled alternatives.
The NFL’s efforts complement current advances on the collegiate degree, with the primary NCAA convention launching a varsity girls’s flag soccer division and the game changing into sanctioned at the highschool degree in a number of states. The NFL’s promotional campaigns, together with that includes flag soccer on the Professional Bowl and supporting girls’s flag soccer development, are designed to foster inclusivity and break down longstanding gender obstacles in soccer.
Flag soccer will make its Olympic debut on the 2028 Los Angeles Video games as a part of a collaborative effort involving the NFL, USA Soccer, and the Worldwide Federation of American Soccer (IFAF). This landmark inclusion displays the game’s broad enchantment and worldwide development, with roughly 20 million folks taking part globally throughout greater than 100 nations, in keeping with the NFL. The Olympic highlight is anticipated to amplify flag soccer’s visibility and encourage thousands and thousands of younger athletes worldwide.
The brand new skilled flag soccer leagues are additionally considered as a possibility to draw new demographics to the game, together with youthful followers, households, and ladies. NFL officers have indicated the league will leverage the fast-paced and skillful nature of flag soccer to create an thrilling product for broadcast and streaming platforms. Main sponsors already present sturdy curiosity in supporting the league, with corporations like Nike, Visa, and Toyota concerned in NFL youth flag soccer championships, per Morning Brew, signaling promising industrial potential for the skilled league.
For this story, Fortune used generative AI to assist with an preliminary draft. An editor verified the accuracy of the data earlier than publishing.
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