A new professional soccer team is launching in Winnipeg, just a year after the last one folded.
This time, it’s a women’s team.
Co-founders Desiree Scott, the recently retired Winnipeg midfielder, and Rob Gale, a former coach of Valour FC, the city’s pro men’s team that folded after its 2025 season, announced the Northern Super League expansion team at a news conference Tuesday. Christina Litz, the president of the league and another Manitoban, was also there.
“This is a moment I’ve dreamed about for a very long time,” said Scott, an Olympic goal medallist. “We finally have a pathway from grassroots soccer all the way to the professional game.”
The team is anticipated to start play at the Ralph Cantafio Soccer Complex on Waverley Avenue next year, based on a city document that commits $600,000 funding for upgrades “subject to confirming a Northern Super League” club. The team wouldn’t confirm its home field on Tuesday.
Scott said there’s a 30 per cent local ownership stake in the as-yet-unnamed team. It will be the seventh in the league, which had its first season in 2024.
Whether professional women’s soccer can make a go of it in a market where a men’s team shut down after only seven seasons is a question that seemed anticipated from the start.
A promotional social media video features the tag line “Destroy Doubt,” playing on Scott’s nickname, the Destroyer, and Winnipeg’s reputation.
“I think a lot of people doubt Winnipeg and what it’s about, and so that ‘Destroy Doubt’ piece is just, like, we’re silencing the noise,” Scott said.
“If we believe it, we can achieve it,” Gale said during the announcement.
“This isn’t just about building a soccer club. It’s about building something that lasts, something our kids grow up cheering, something future generations are proud to support.”
The women’s sports industry is growing rapidly, and it’s about time, Gale said.
“Some people still ask if women’s sports are just having a moment,” he said. “This is a movement and not a moment, and it’s only going to get bigger.”
Vijay Setlur, a marketing instructor at the Schulich School of Business at York University, said the new team can capitalize on that growing interest.
“Whether it’s the PWHL or the WNBA and now the Northern Super League, there’s a greater interest in women’s sports,” he said Tuesday morning.
The interest is not just from fans, but also from brands, because there’s a different audience, and people see supporting women’s sport as more altruistic, Setlur said.
“Women’s sports can tap into a crowd that perhaps maybe isn’t as interested in men’s sports,” he said, including women who don’t watch other pro teams.
A Northern Super League franchise also doesn’t need to pull in as many fans in order to break even, Setlur said.
And lower ticket prices provide opportunities for families who can’t necessarily afford Bombers or Jets games, he said.
There will also be soccer fans looking for a new team after Valour FC’s demise, Setlur said.
“I think the team has the potential to do well financially if it receives the support that it should get.”
The drawback is that Winnipeg has a smaller population to draw fans from, Setlur said.
“It’s just a matter of what these individual teams can do to separate themselves in a market that’s passionate about sports.”
Moshe Lander, an economics lecturer at Concordia University in Montreal with expertise in sports and gaming, has doubts about not only the Winnipeg franchise but the entire league.
“There’s a bunch of problems, and they’re not necessarily Winnipeg-specific,” he said Tuesday.
Lander thinks the organizers of the Northern Super League made a huge mistake by setting up their own league instead of joining the National Women’s Soccer League, which currently only has U.S. teams.
“While Canada right now is one of the top soccer countries in the world, there’s just not enough top players to fill all of those teams, and so the U.S. is going to have a much easier time developing a better-tier soccer league.”
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On top of that, the Northern Super League doesn’t have an expansion draft, so teams have to fight for players, making it hard to build, Lander said.
“If the first few years of this Winnipeg soccer franchise are going to be bottom-of-the-barrel performance within the league, because it’s designed that way, are the fans going to come out?” he asked.
“You better be prepared to support a loser.”
Supporting a loser is not what young soccer players at Tuesday’s announcement were thinking about.
Scott, who retired from professional play last year, is the director of technical development and initiatives for youth soccer organization FC Northwest in Winnipeg. Young women from that organization showed up in force Tuesday to cheer on their hero’s latest endeavour.
“She’s awesome. She’s my coach, and she has always kind of been that role model,” said Madilynn Poon, who plans to get tickets to the new team’s games.
“She takes over an idea and she just goes through with it, and that’s what she did here.”
