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Last week, the National Women’s Soccer League awarded a new expansion franchise — in Columbus, Ohio — to an ownership group led by Haslam Sports Group for a fee of $205 million.
This represents a $50 million jump from the $165 million that billionaire Arthur Blank reportedly paid for the league’s Atlanta franchise in November. And that $165 million itself was a jump of $55 million from the reported $110 million fee Denver paid in January of last year.
Rewind to 2022, and the expansion fee for a new NWSL club was just $2 million.
