Sam Kerr has signed a deal through 2030 with Gotham FC. The deal comes full circle, as she played for Sky Blue, which later became Gotham FC, from 2015 to 2017.
Kerr feels she can become even better given the right surroundings. She’s already considered one of the best players in the world, and her return to the National Women’s Soccer League comes after seven seasons with Chelsea in the WSL.
“I have full confidence in myself that I can still play to the best of my ability, if not better. I’ve scored some of the best goals I’ve ever scored this year, some at the Asian Cup, some in my last game at Chelsea, and I think that just shows that if I’m put in the park with the right people around me and the right coach to coach me, I can still get the best of my ability,” she said Thursday.
Kerr is expected to be available for the Queen’s Classic between Gotham and the Washington Spirit at New York’s Citi Field on July 15. More than 30,000 tickets have already been sold.
She previously played for NWSL’S Chicago Red Stars before moving to Chelsea in 2019. Kerr is still the leading scorer in the regular season with 77 goals; she’s also won the league MVP award in 2017 and 2019.
“I feel like last time I left Gotham, we were Sky Blue at the time, we were playing down in front of a couple of thousand people, and this is the type of stuff that we were fighting for, fighting to play in front of sold-out stadiums with the best facilities, with the best players, with wages that we deserve,” Kerr said.
“So I feel like this was like a full circle moment for me, and there’s so many people that have done so many amazing things over the last six years, while I’ve been gone, that have allowed me to come back and kind of live out my American dream.”
The 32-year-old has also led the Matildas to the semi-finals of the 2023 Women’s World Cup held by Australia and New Zealand. She is also Australia’s all-time leading scorer with 75 international goals.
Yael Averbuch West, president of soccer operations for Gotham FC, didn’t agree to discuss the financial aspects of Kerr’s contract.
“Every phase of a player’s career looks different in terms of the skills they need and how they need to evolve, so as she is in this particular phase and moment in her career, we are going to help her to evolve and help her with her physical longevity and a lot of aspects of things that, ultimately, it’s very important to us that our players feel like we are helping them to progress their individual careers,” Averbuch West said.
At Chelsea, the striker scored 116 goals in all competitions, tying Chelsea’s all-time leading scorer, Fran Kirby.
According to Kerr, she’s grown in her time away from the NWSL, just as the league has grown.
“I just want to be like any other player, competing for spots, competing for time on the pitch,” she said. “I know when I was here previously, I was just like a young kid; I was striving to be the best, and I come back with a lot of experience and a lot of trophies under my belt. But I think this league has changed so much since I’ve been gone that it would be naive of me to think that I was going to come back in and have the same sort of, I guess, impact straight away.”
