Changing the Game

Members of Angel City FC’s 2023 preseason team at the club’s training facility in Thousand Oaks, California

Kara Nortman was on a mission. After attending the 2015 FIFA Women’s World Cup soccer final in Vancouver, Canada, where the U.S. Women’s National Team (USWNT) defeated Japan in an electrifying 5–2 game, she was determined to buy American defender Meghan Klingenberg’s jersey for her then five-year-old daughter, Layla. And yet, Nortman says, she couldn’t find one anywhere. “I went to store after store,” she recalls. “I finally found a jersey that fit, but it was blank and had no name on it.”

When Nortman—a venture capitalist with a background in tech—returned home to Los Angeles, she realized she also couldn’t find regular-season National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) matches on TV. Then the USWNT won again at the 2019 World Cup, with a team headlined by Megan Rapinoe, Alex Morgan, and Christen Press, three players from a group that had launched a high-
profile lawsuit against the United States Soccer Federation over unequal pay compared with that of the men’s team players.

To Nortman, the overwhelming interest represented an opportunity. “You had a billion people watching on broadcast and another half billion on streaming,” she says. “You have an activation at the highest level, but then you can’t do anything with your enthusiasm.”

Nortman found someone whose enthusiasm matched her own in actress Natalie Portman. The two had met at an event in 2018 and bonded over their love for women’s soccer and their dedication to pay equity.

Head coach Freya Coombe

It was against that backdrop that Nortman and Portman decided to host a gathering of players, actors, and business executives to brainstorm how to not only better support women’s soccer in the U.S. but also develop a new model for women’s sports teams that placed empowerment and equity at the center. “Alex Morgan, Megan Rapinoe, Christen Press, and all of their teammates were so impressive winning the World Cup while fighting for equal pay on a very public stage,” Portman says. “It’s asking a question loudly: Why aren’t we supporting these superstar icon athletes, on home turf, in their league?”

The answer would become the Angel City FC. Established in 2020, it’s Los Angeles’s first women’s professional soccer team in over a decade. Run more like a start-up than a traditional professional sports franchise, it’s currently the only team in the National Women’s Soccer League with three female founders—Nortman, Portman, and entrepreneur Julie Uhrman. The team gives a percentage of ticket sales to its players and donates 10 percent of its sponsorship dollars to the community. And with more than 60 female investors—including celebrities like Eva Longoria and Jennifer Garner, as well as soccer stars like Mia Hamm and Julie Foudy—Angel City currently has the distinction of being the largest female-led ownership group in professional sports.

As Angel City kicks off its sophomore season this spring, Nortman, Portman, Uhrman, and several of the other investors, players, and supporters who have helped build it from scratch spoke with Harper’s Bazaar about what it took to bring their vision to life.

Angel City FC cofounders Kara Nortman, Natalie Portman, and Julie Uhrman in 2022.

KARA NORTMAN (cofounder, Angel City): After the 2019 World Cup, I’d text Natalie essays on funding a union—all this stuff about collective action. She kept writing back, “Why don’t we start a team?”

NATALIE PORTMAN (cofounder, Angel City): I was looking for something theatrical, something dramatic, because I think that’s the way you get change the fastest.

NORTMAN: The most important decision you make is, who are you going to cofound a company with? I got a lot of confidence from the fact that Natalie didn’t think I was crazy. We needed somebody who could run it day to day because I had a full-time job. I started doing what I did in my [day] job, which is find someone to fill in a skill-set gap that you know is needed to launch this thing.

JULIE UHRMAN (cofounder and president, Angel City): Kara had just come back from the [2019] World Cup and was telling me about her escapades. She pulled me aside and said, “Natalie and I are considering bringing a women’s professional soccer team to L.A. Do you have the bandwidth to help us?”

NORTMAN: We kept getting noes. So many people said, “Listen, you have nine professional sports teams in L.A. and two quasiprofessional sports teams in USC and UCLA. Nobody wants to show up for a 12th team. Who has time in L.A.? It’s sunny, it’s beautiful.”

Goalkeeper Brittany Isenhour

Goalkeeper Brittany Isenhour

ALEXIS OHANIAN (cofounder, Reddit; leading investor, Angel City): During the 2019 Women’s World Cup final, [my daughter] Olympia was running around in her Alex Morgan jersey, and I posted a fun video of it. I mused, “Wouldn’t it be nice if she played on the Women’s National Team one day?” My wife [Serena Williams] didn’t miss a beat and said, “Not until they pay her what she’s worth.” I was like, “Challenge accepted.” When average American sports fans think of soccer greatness, they think of American women. They think of [Brandi] Chastain and that penalty kick, tearing off her shirt. Or Megan [Rapinoe] mouthing off against [Trump]. I can sell greatness. I started reaching out to existing owners in the league, saying, “I want to start a team. I want to fund a team. Let’s go.” Because I was ranting about this on Twitter, I kept getting intros to various folks. When I sat down with the Angel City team, they had been thinking along the same lines.

UHRMAN: The [first] people who understood what we were trying to do and wanted to be a part of it were celebrities and athletes. They understand what it’s like to build a platform and use it to forward their social initiatives. Eva Longoria was the first to sign on.

EVA LONGORIA (actor; founding investor, Angel City): I loved that it was the only majority-female-founded, female-owned, and female-run pro soccer team. [We] didn’t do it for the investment opportunity. We wanted to show the league that if you pay players fairly, you can still make a business from it.

JENNIFER GARNER (actor; founding investor, Angel City): Natalie invited me to a [USWNT exhibition] game and said she felt like Los Angeles should have its own women’s soccer team. I’m not somebody who is investing in this and investing in that. If
I have any money, it’s in a pillow or under my bed. But I was like, “I have
to. It’s women’s soccer in L.A.” I felt completely compelled to participate from the beginning, no matter what happened.

JULIE FOUDY (former USWNT player; two-time FIFA Women’s World Cup champion; two-time Olympic gold medalist; founding investor, Angel City): Mia [Hamm] and I felt this could be fun for all the [former] players who had ties to Southern California. Because some of those players [weren’t] able to afford the normal fee to get in, we founded an umbrella group. We call it the Angels 12. We each have a share in it, but everyone gives different amounts.

Head coach Freya Coombe and assistant coaches Becki Tweed and Eleri Earnshaw

ANGELA HUCLES MANGANO (former USWNT player; two-time Olympic gold medalist; founding investor and general manager, Angel City): I got the email from Julie Foudy and Mia Hamm asking if we wanted to invest in this club. Everybody pretty much responded and said, “Absolutely yes, 100 percent. LFG. Where do I send my check?”

FOUDY: So much of our existence as female athletes is spent convincing people why they should bet on women. And [with]this group, you never had to convince them.

UHRMAN: We wanted to build an organization where mission and capital could coexist. Revenue without impact is not a win for us. Impact without revenue is not a win for us. We needed to do both at the same time.

PORTMAN: We give 10 percent of our revenue to the community, whether it’s giving out food or sports bras to girls who were stopping sports because they couldn’t afford them.

LONGORIA: We deliver meals with DoorDash, one of our sponsors. We train female coaches and youth players and donate soccer balls. There are mentorship programs, volunteering. That’s always been part of our DNA.

UHRMAN: What made Freya [Coombe, Angel City’s head coach] compelling was that she had coached in the NWSL and was familiar with the players in our league.

FREYA COOMBE (head coach, Angel City): I had been coaching in New York—Gotham FC—since 2019. My GM had been approached about whether I would interview for the position [of head coach]. The values that the club was based on—the fight for equality and the ambition—was a very exciting prospect.

NORTMAN: We wanted players who would build a foundation for us defensively and offensively and people who represented our community. Christen [Press] ended up being all of those things.

CHRISTEN PRESS (former USWNT player; two-time FIFA Women’s World Cup champion; Olympic bronze medalist; first player signed to Angel City): It was early in 2020 when rumblings about the team were getting louder. Everybody who knows me knew right away that I’d want to be there.

ALI RILEY (team captain, Angel City): I remember as soon as I heard about it, [thinking] it’s too good to be true. There had been rumors for 12 years that a team would come back to L.A. It wasn’t until Christen was signed that I believed it would happen. I don’t know how much longer I’m going to play. I thought, if any of these last years could be spent in Los Angeles, I’m going to make the most of it. It ended up exceeding my wildest dreams.

Defender Sarah Gorden

General manager Angela Hucles Mangano and her children

PRESS: As somebody who fought for equal pay for over a decade on the USWNT, I’d been saying, “You can’t compare revenues unless you compare investment. You can’t compare the money that’s going out unless you’re comparing the money that’s going in.” This was an opportunity to prove that.

NORTMAN: We were building the engine while flying the plane. We had to share [practice facilities] with the L.A. Rams [football team], and we had changes on our coaching staff. There was a big learning curve.

PRESS: If you say we’re going to create an equitable experience for players, what does that mean for resources? That has been part of how I see my job—making sure I’m constantly advocating for what the team needs when it comes to equipment, staffing, and a professional standard so that when we’re put in a stadium with over 20,000 people, we feel prepared because we have [everything] we need to be successful.

Forward Simone Charley

NORTMAN: We knew that this was real and special. We’d sold our season tickets. We had our funding and sponsors in place. We had our team and our supporters group.

COOMBE: You could tell the players were nervous and not [wanting] to show that anyone was nervous. It was like, “Let’s recognize how we feel, but let’s also know that we are ready for this moment.”

RILEY: When I saw those fans and the jerseys and the love, I was like, “Women’s soccer is here to stay. It is here to stay in Los Angeles. It is here to stay in this country. And all these little girls will be able to dream so much bigger than I ever was able to.”

UHRMAN: They scored two goals within the first 15 minutes and held on through 10 minutes of stoppage time to win 2–1 against the [North Carolina Courage], one of the winningest teams in the league. It was the best day of my life.

LONGORIA: We’ve smashed so many records, whether it’s [having] the highest revenue of any NWSL team or passing $10 million in ticket sales in our first season.

COOMBE: We are fortunate that we have people connected with Angel City who played on the USWNT, who didn’t have the same opportunities. I feel we are carrying the baton for the advancement of women’s sports.

Angel City FC players before a scrimmage

PORTMAN: To see my son idolize female athletes feels like an immediate culture shift. And of course my daughter [too]. But it’s when you see the boys…It has a huge impact on the way kids’ brains work when they get to look up to women in the same way.

GARNER: The scale is tipping toward taking women’s sports more seriously. I’m on set now, and every day someone is wearing Angel City merch. That’s what people are excited to talk to me about. And it’s men, little boys, and it’s little girls. So, yes, there’s a shift. Hell yeah, there’s a shift.

OHANIAN: In 10 years, I hope it is my most obvious investment. I hope everyone is like, “Oh yeah, way to go. Golf clap, Alexis.” When I first started tweeting about it back in 2019, there was a lot of skepticism. And that’s healthy. I saved every one of those tweets. Every time we hit a new ticket sales record or sellout attendance, I tag the people on Twitter with a screenshot of their tweet telling me I was going to lose all my money and that no one cared about women’s soccer.

UHRMAN: Young boys are wearing their jerseys and saying that Christen Press is as important to them as LeBron James.

GARNER: It changes what young women and girls see as possible. And not just in soccer. It validates them, full stop. It validates them expecting to have half the seats at the table.

RILEY: I grew up an Asian American woman feeling different in [my] sport. Being mixed race or nonwhite, you can be made to feel different. We’re changing the culture and shouting it from the rooftops.

Andrea Cuttler is the Entertainment Director of Harper’s BAZAAR , where she oversees all things film, television, and celebrity. When she’s not watching her DVD of Indian Summer for the 27th time, you can likely find her at one of the same three restaurants in the West Village. 

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