Daniela Porcelli / SPP
The Satisfaction have acquired Zambian ahead Barbra Banda from Chinese language Tremendous League group Shanghai Shengli for a $740,000 switch charge, a supply acquainted with the deal confirmed to The Equalizer. The charge is the second highest in world historical past behind Zambian teammate Racheal Kundananji, whose transfer to NWSL enlargement group Bay FC set the worldwide document final month.
Banda’s contract with the Satisfaction is a four-year deal valued at round $2.1 million all-in together with bonuses, a supply confirmed, which can make her one of many highest-paid gamers within the NWSL.
CBS Sports activities was first to report Banda’s transfer to Orlando.
Orlando will incur an extra salary-cap hit to amass Banda for spending past the NWSL’s new $500,000 web switch threshold. A few of that cap hit will be purchased down with allocation cash.
Whereas many world switch home windows are closed till summer season, the NWSL’s major switch window stays open till April 16. Like with Kundananji, who Madrid CFF transferred to Bay FC for €735,000 (about $788,000 on the time, plus one other $75,000 in doable add-ons), Banda’s switch charge was pushed by a lofty buyout clause in her Shanghai contract, a supply acquainted with the deal confirmed.
Banda’s breakout got here on the Tokyo Olympics in 2021. She scored hat methods in back-to-back group video games, changing into the primary lady in Olympic historical past to attain successive hat methods and to attain two hat methods in the identical match. Zambia struggled on the match, shedding these video games 10-3 to the Netherlands and drawing China 4-4, however Banda’s expertise drew world consideration.
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A 12 months later, Banda was the topic of controversy after she and three different gamers have been banned from Africa’s championship and World Cup qualifying occasion for what CAF officers claimed have been testosterone ranges above the confederation’s permitted restrict. Previous to final 12 months’s World Cup, an Related Press report detailed a “flawed course of” that mistreated Banda.
Zambia certified for the 2023 World Cup with out its star, and Banda was cleared by FIFA to compete on the world match. There, she scored the 1,000th objective in Ladies’s World Cup historical past final 12 months from the penalty spot in Zambia’s 3-1 victory over Costa Rica.
Banda joins a rising wave of African gamers coming into the NWSL, together with her Zambian teammate, Kundananji. Nigeria ahead Asisat Oshoala additionally lately transferred to Bay FC from FC Barcelona. Orlando’s charge for Banda provides to the booming ladies’s soccer switch market. FIFA mentioned the January 2023 switch window set a document with $2.1 million in charges paid, a 165% improve from January 2023.
