NWSLPA AND NWSL JOIN PROJECT ACL TO SUPPORT WOMEN’S SOCCER INJURY RESEARCH

Originally launched in England in the Women’s Super League (WSL), Project ACL will now span two of the world’s leading women’s leagues in a coordinated approach to better understand and address the multifactorial causes of ACL injuries in the women’s game.

The NWSLPA and NWSL will work with existing project partners FIFPRO, Nike and Leeds Beckett University to build an evidence-informed body of work that helps the women’s soccer industry. The initiative examines not only the physical causes of ACL injuries but also the professional environment in which players train, compete and recover.

ACL injuries are more than twice as likely to occur in women than men, and about two-thirds of ACL injuries in women’s soccer occur without contact, according to existing research. However, there is little understanding about how to reduce these injuries in professional women players. As little as 8 percent of sports science research is focused on women, much of it based on amateur athletes.

Since its launch, the project research team, supported by the Professional Footballers Association (PFA), the English player union, surveyed multidisciplinary teams across all 12 WSL clubs about available resources and injury-prevention strategies as well as conducting interviews with more than 30 players about their experiences.

The project is also tracking players’ workload, travel and ‘critical zone’ appearances – games with less than five days of recovery time - via the FIFPRO Player Workload Monitoring tool to assess potential links between scheduling demands and injury risk.

The collaboration with the NWSLPA and NWSL was formally launched at an event at Nike’s New York headquarters.

Dr. Alex Culvin, Director of Women’s Football at FIFPRO, said: “We are incredibly excited to bring the NWSLPA and the NWSL to Project ACL, which now comprises two of the biggest leagues in women’s soccer. Overall, we believe that player-centricity and collaboration with key stakeholders are central to establishing meaningful change in the soccer ecosystem and that players, competition organizers and stakeholders around the world will benefit from Project ACL’s outputs and outcomes.”

Tori Huster, Deputy Executive Director at the NWSLPA, said: “The NWSLPA is proud to join Project ACL, which brings together players, leagues and researchers to better understand ACL injuries. That understanding requires looking beyond the individual and examining the conditions players train and compete in each day. Project ACL is an opportunity to build the kind of player-centric evidence that can lead to meaningful changes across women’s professional soccer.”

Sarah Gregorius, Vice-President of Sporting at the NWSL, said: “Player health and performance are fundamental to the future of our league, and this is an area where we intend to lead. Joining Project ACL is an important part of the league’s continued commitment to advancing player safety, bringing together research, data and collaboration to better understand and reduce ACL injuries in women’s soccer. By continuing to invest in this work, we can help build environments where our players are better supported and able to perform at their best.”

Dr. Stacey Emmonds, Reader in Sports Performance at Leeds Beckett University, which conducts world-leading research and innovative collaborations across sports, said: “We’re excited to continue advancing our research within Project ACL. We are looking forward to supporting the development of evidence-informed practices across the NWSL, helping to translate high-quality research into real-world impact on the pitch.”