{"id":749543,"date":"2026-08-25T19:26:14","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T19:26:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/749543\/"},"modified":"2026-08-25T19:26:14","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T19:26:14","slug":"wsl-academy-teams-to-play-in-third-tier-after-fa-approves-controversial-plan-womens-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/749543\/","title":{"rendered":"WSL academy teams to play in third tier after FA approves controversial plan | Women&#8217;s football"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">Four Women\u2019s Super League academy sides will play in tier three of the pyramid from the 2027-28 season after <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/football\/2026\/apr\/07\/wsl-academy-teams-to-play-in-third-tier-fa-plans-womens-national-league\" data-link-name=\"in body link\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">the controversial proposal<\/a> was approved by the Football Association\u2019s board.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">The change forms part of what the FA described as a package of reforms to the Women\u2019s National League \u201cdesigned to strengthen the women\u2019s football pyramid, raise standards across the league, and improve the development pathway for young players\u201d.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">The FA said data showed that young English players were getting significantly fewer competitive minutes than their counterparts across Europe\u2019s leading leagues.<\/p>\n<p>Quick GuideHow do I sign up for sport breaking news alerts?Show<\/p>\n<p>In the Guardian app, tap the Profile settings button at the top right, then select Notifications. Turn on sport notifications.<\/p>\n<p>If you already have the Guardian app, make sure you\u2019re on the most recent version.<\/p>\n<p>If you don&#8217;t have the Guardian app, download it from the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/itunes.apple.com\/app\/the-guardian\/id409128287?mt=8\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">iOS App Store<\/a>\u00a0on iPhone or the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/play.google.com\/store\/apps\/details?id=com.guardian\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Google Play store<\/a>\u00a0on Android by searching for &#8216;The Guardian&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Thank you for your feedback.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">The FA said WNL clubs would receive central funding for the first time and that changes to the loan market would encourage clubs from the top two divisions to loan players to clubs in the third and fourth tiers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">The WSL academy teams will not be eligible for promotion and will be chosen against criteria to be developed in the coming months, the FA said. With the third tier split into two geographical regions, it is expected that two academies will be placed in the northern division and two in the southern.<\/p>\n<p class=\"dcr-1s160rg\">Sue Day, director of women\u2019s football at the FA, said: \u201cFor the game to continue moving forward, the FA Women\u2019s National League must evolve alongside the professional game, and we need to create more opportunities for talented young English players to develop in senior football.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Four Women\u2019s Super League academy sides will play in tier three of the pyramid from the 2027-28 season&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":749544,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[33],"tags":[218,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-749543","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-football","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/749543","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=749543"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/749543\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/749544"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=749543"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=749543"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=749543"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}