English soccer’s Women’s Super League completed its first season under new management on Saturday: a company made up of all the clubs competing in the top two tiers, replacing direct control from the Football Association. Naturally, it appears that they wanted to put their aesthetic stamp on things starting today by updating the league’s logos and for the second tier, its name.
The basis of the new look is a swirly circle used by the controlling company itself, now named WSL Football, replacing what we now know was a placeholder name of Women’s Professional Leagues Ltd.
It’s unclear if the swirly circle will also be used for the leagues or not. (I would say probably, but we’ll have to see.) The Women’s Super League did not change its name, but got a new text logo that is at the top of this post. The second tier did change its name from the Women’s Championship back to what it used to be from 2014-2018, WSL 2, and got a text logo with the opposite colors of the WSL.
That name change is for the better because the ex-Women’s Championship was one of several second tiers throughout the world that had the “Championship” name, taking after the original, the English Football League’s men’s Championship. But while that makes sense for the EFL because the men’s Championship is in fact its highest level, it doesn’t for most of the others sharing its name, including this one, because they’re not the highest level of something. So that’s a welcome reversion.
Read more from the WSL here. We have been promised more throughout the offseason, which would include among other things new sleeve patches and a ball design.
The British and their attempts at modern logos…I may be slightly prejudiced (I love going to the UK, nicest people ever and I was there 3 weeks ago spending 4 great days) but this is a land with a weak modern graphic tradition where comic sans still rules and where they just love gradients as a way to soften things visually. As for preserving great historical logos and crests, the British are unbeatable. These logos could be for any AI company, online bank or crypto currency. And I really dislike the font.
This comment will be in my mind forever now every time I see something new and visual from England.
An English person/people may have had the final say, but the agency that did the rebranding is based out of New York.
Point well taken, Charlie.