Newly appointed executive vice president of the Orlando Pride Amanda Duffy is ready to start her new journey in taking the helm of the NWSL franchise — but not until Feb 16.
Duffy spoke last week regarding the interesting dynamic that she currently sits in, serving as NWSL president and having been just recently appointed to her new role with the Pride.
From now until the 16th, Duffy will continue to put 100% of her efforts into her current position with the league. In the interim, Marc Skinner and Erik Ustruck will continue to build the team’s roster as they see fit, with the blessing from Duffy to go forward.
“I’m fully confident that Eric and Marc and the technical staff here have been working on decisions that are being made now for a while,” Duffy told the Orlando Soccer Journal. “I’m confident in some of the things that I understand are happening and certainly look forward to being more engaged in that process once I do actually get started with the Pride.”
With that confidence behind Skinner, Duffy also expressed her understanding behind the first-year NWSL head coach and just how hard it can be to adjust to the league.
“Just wanting to better understand how that experience was for him and the thinking and approach around coming into the season is a lot of what our conversations have been so far,” Duffy said, “We’ll dig deeper into more specific philosophies and strategies and player identification, talent identification, and strategies. There’s certainly a desire to win now, but there’s also got to be a component of long-term growth and planning for any organization and certainly for this one.”
For now, Duffy remains focused on the finalization of the NWSL schedule, which she mentioned should be out before she leaves Orlando to go back north to finish up her tenure with the league. She also teased a few other important announcements for the league over the next “three to four weeks which will be exciting for the league.”
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