{"id":239339,"date":"2026-04-20T19:43:08","date_gmt":"2026-04-20T19:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/239339\/"},"modified":"2026-04-20T19:43:08","modified_gmt":"2026-04-20T19:43:08","slug":"uswnt-star-allie-long-joins-usl-super-leagues-fort-lauderdale","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/239339\/","title":{"rendered":"USWNT Star Allie Long Joins USL Super League&#8217;s Fort Lauderdale"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Allie Long is back on the field \u2014 and bringing her experience to the <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/seattle-reign-defender-sofia-huerta-invests-in-usl-super-league-team-ac-boise\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">USL Gainbridge<\/a> <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/seattle-reign-defender-sofia-huerta-invests-in-usl-super-league-team-ac-boise\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">Super League<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The former USWNT midfielder signed with Fort Lauderdale United FC for the remainder of the 2025\/26 season. This makes Long the first World Cup champion to join the US league.<\/p>\n<p>Long&#8217;s arrival marks a significant moment for the USL Gainbridge Super League, which launched in 2024 as a <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/united-soccer-league-launch-professional-soccer-nwsl-rival\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">top-flight pro league<\/a> alongside the NWSL.<\/p>\n<p>At 38, Long made clear she had no plans to slow down.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve never been out,&#8221; Long told <a href=\"https:\/\/www.espn.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">ESPN<\/a>. &#8220;I&#8217;ve never announced my retirement because it was always on my heart. I&#8217;m super excited to see where this goes and what comes of it. You&#8217;ll probably have to roll me off the field when I&#8217;m 49 years old.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>She joins Fort Lauderdale as the club pushes toward the postseason, adding veteran leadership and championship pedigree to a roster still developing its identity.<\/p>\n<p>Long last played a full professional season in 2023 with Gotham FC, helping the club win the NWSL Championship after returning from <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/gotham-fc-allie-long-pregnancy-uswnt-midfielder\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">maternity leave<\/a>. Prior to that, she played key role on the USWNT&#8217;s 2019 World Cup win.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;When a <a href=\"https:\/\/justwomenssports.com\/reads\/uswnt-world-cup-roster-2023-vs-2019\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener nofollow\">World Cup champion<\/a> chooses to be part of what you&#8217;re creating, that means something,&#8221; Fort Lauderdale chairman Tommy Smith said in a team statement.<\/p>\n<p>The signing highlights the growing pull of the USL Super League as it continues to establish itself as a top-level women&#8217;s soccer option in the United States.<\/p>\n<p>But for Long, it&#8217;s all for love of the game.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I love the game so much and I&#8217;m a competitor,&#8221; she said. &#8220;I just want to walk off the field that I dedicated my whole life to in a place where I feel good leaving.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Allie Long is back on the field \u2014 and bringing her experience to the USL Gainbridge Super League.&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":239340,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[106016,249,251,250,57302,25431,67963,39424],"class_list":{"0":"post-239339","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fort-lauderdale","8":"tag-allie-long","9":"tag-fort-lauderdale","10":"tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","11":"tag-fort-lauderdale-news","12":"tag-fort-lauderdale-united-fc","13":"tag-usl","14":"tag-usl-super-league","15":"tag-uswnt"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239339","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=239339"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/239339\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/239340"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=239339"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=239339"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=239339"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}