When Mark Parsons joined Angel City as sporting director 19 months ago, the first order of business was to find a head coach. The club had fired its first two managers and was about to open training camp without one.
But for Parsons, finding the right person was more important than finding a person right now.
“Time in getting it done is not the priority,” he said then. “Getting the right person is.”
So Parsons conducted an extensive global search before settling on Alexander Straus, who had won three straight Bundesliga titles with Bayern Munich. Straus lasted just a year in the NWSL, losing more than twice as many games as he won.
Now, 2½ months after firing Straus, Parsons is deep into another coaching search. And once again, he won’t be rushed.
“I don’t want to put a date on this,” he said. “Finding that person’s the priority. But getting to the right answer is the most important.”
Time may be running short for Angel City. With a large, deep-pocketed ownership group headed by World Cup champions and A-list Hollywood celebrities, Angel City has been the NWSL’s most valuable and most visible team since entering the league in 2022. But those resources have bought just one playoff berth and one winning season. As a result, fans are losing patience, one reason why attendance has plummeted nearly 20% over the past two seasons.
Since Straus was sacked in mid-June, however, the team has lost just once in eight matches under interim coach Leif Gunnar Smerud, pulling to within one spot and three points of a playoff berth. With Sunday’s scoreless draw with league-leading Gotham FC — the team’s fourth consecutive tie — Angel City (7-7-5) is a win away from matching the single-season franchise record for wins with 11 games left in the season.
Success appears near. Yet Parsons still won’t be rushed, focusing more on the future than the present.
“We want to win. But we know winning can take time,” he said. “We want to win every day, every week but developing and growing and improving every day is important to us.”
The good news, Parsons said, is the foundation he and majority owners Bob Iger and Willow Bay have built is the firmest in the team’s short, dysfunctional history.
Last season Parsons said he made more than 40 transactions, among them the sale of winger Alyssa Thompson to Chelsea on what could prove to be the richest transfer in NWSL history. In addition, the retirements of aging high-priced veterans Christen Press and Ali Riley freed up space both on the roster and under the league’s $3.7-million salary cap.
Angel City sporting director Mark Parsons speaks during a news conference in January 2025.
(Al Seib / For The Times)
Under Parsons, Angel City has gone from having one of the oldest rosters in the NWSL to having the third-youngest, adding 25-year-old Sveindís Jonsdottir and 22-year-old Brazilian Maiara Niehues, who share the team scoring lead with six goals apiece; and 21-year-old Evelyn Shores, who leads the team in assists with four. U.S. women’s national team defender Gisele Thompson, 20, is one of just two outfield players to start all 19 games this season.
Iger and Bay have also invested in the front office, doubling the sporting director’s staff.
“We have a sporting strategy that is driving all major decisions,” said Parsons, who previously built struggling teams into NWSL finalists in Washington and Portland. “We know who we are in our sports strategy. We know who we are in our style of play.
“I’ve gone through change like this in other organizations,” he added. “I’ve never felt more stable and clear on what we’re doing and where we are and where we’re going.”
But the journey has been trying for the fans and players. Goalkeeper Angelina Anderson has played under five managers, including interim coaches, during her four seasons at Angel City and she said permanent change can be unsettling.
Angel City majority owner Bob Iger greets defender Savy King after a match against Washington at BMO Stadium on Aug. 16.
(Kevin Terrell / Getty Images)
“There’s just kind of a sense of instability and a little bit of ‘here we go again,’” she said. “For a while the players struggled a little bit with ‘hey, if this is going to keep happening, how can we trust the process?’”
Anderson said each time a new coach arrived, players had to go through an adjustment period, auditioning anew for a position they already occupied while learning how the coach operated and how he or she wanted the team to play. Having gone through that process so many times, Anderson said the transition from Straus to Smerud has been seamless.
“It does feel different now,” said Anderson, who extended her club records for clean sheets in a season (six) and career (nine) with Sunday’s shutout. “Even though there’s still coaching changes and stuff, I think we have a different level of trust with management. You can tell in the way that we’re playing and how we operate.”
As for what went wrong with Straus, his handpicked coach, Parsons called the question “not relevant or fair.”
“Actually a lot of things did go well and did go right. Now there are new needs, new expectations, new standards,” he said.
The fact Angel City won just one of Straus’ final eight games apparently wasn’t the standard Parsons was aiming for.
“We’re very, very clear how we play, the standards and behaviors we expect, and we need to see growth in that every single week. And we weren’t meeting the things that we need to meet,” Parsons said. “We moved on. The era moved on. We’re now a different group.”
Maybe. But what Angel City really needs now are different results, because another losing record and another season without a playoff trip won’t be seen as a sign of progress no matter how much Parsons pleads for patience.
⚽ You have read the latest installment of On Soccer with Kevin Baxter. The weekly column takes you behind the scenes and shines a spotlight on unique stories. Listen to Baxter on this week’s episode of the “Corner of the Galaxy” podcast.
