For a long time, one of the biggest questions around women's football has been simple:
Can the growing interest in the game turn into serious commercial money?
London City Lionesses have just provided a pretty strong answer.
The Women's Super League club has signed a new multi year deal with Nike that will see the sportswear company become the main sponsor on the front of the team's shirt.
That might sound like a fairly normal football sponsorship announcement.
It isn't.
London City owner Michele Kang says it is the largest front of shirt sponsorship deal specifically for a women's football team, and that its value is even higher than the shirt sponsorship deals of some men's Premier League clubs. City AM reports that the agreement is worth more than £3 million.
For Pitchonomy, however, the interesting part isn't simply the size of the cheque.
It is what Nike appears to believe London City and women's football more broadly could become.
What has actually happened?
Nike already had a relationship with London City Lionesses.
It supplied the club's kits.
The two sides have now significantly expanded that relationship.
Nike will become the club's front of shirt sponsor, meaning its branding will occupy the main sponsorship position on the team's shirt. The companies have also agreed to extend their existing kit partnership for another four years from the 2027/28 season.
So Nike isn't simply making London City's shirts anymore.
It is putting considerably more money and its brand behind the club.
The partnership will also cover community projects and research and development focused on female athletes. Lionesses
Why does a shirt sponsorship matter so much?
The front of a football shirt is valuable advertising space.
Think about how often it appears.
Players wear the shirt during matches. It appears in photographs, television broadcasts, social media clips, interviews, video games and supporter merchandise.
Every time the team receives attention, the sponsor can receive attention with it.
Companies therefore pay football clubs for that visibility and association.
The more valuable the audience surrounding a club becomes, the more valuable that space can become.
And that's what makes the London City deal particularly interesting.
Nike is effectively making a large financial bet on the value of the audience around a women's football club.
London City aren't operating like an ordinary newly promoted club
To understand the deal, it helps to understand what is happening at London City Lionesses.
The club is owned by Michele Kang, who has been investing heavily in women's football through her wider Kynisca organisation.
London City are also unusual because they are a fully independent women's football club rather than the women's department of a major men's club. The club itself describes London City as the only fully independent team in the WSL.
That makes what Kang is attempting particularly interesting from a business perspective.
Instead of women's football sitting underneath an existing men's football business, the women's team is the business.
And London City have been building aggressively.
Their profile has risen dramatically through major player signings, including stars such as Alexia Putellas, Mary Earps and Mapi León.
Those players don't only make the football team stronger.
They make the brand bigger.
A star player can bring an audience with them
This is an increasingly important part of football's economy.
When a club signs a famous player, it isn't simply signing somebody who can perform on the pitch.
That player may bring millions of followers, international recognition and an existing fanbase.
The Guardian highlighted this in relation to the Nike deal, noting that Putellas alone has millions of Instagram followers.
Think about what that potentially means for a sponsor.
Someone who previously had little interest in London City might follow the club because they follow Putellas.
They might watch clips.
They might buy a shirt.
They might follow the club on Instagram.
They might attend a match.
Suddenly the commercial audience surrounding London City becomes much larger than the number of people physically sitting inside their stadium.
That's valuable to a company such as Nike.
This is where women's football is changing
Women's football has often been discussed in terms of its potential.
More viewers.
Growing attendances.
Increasing participation.
Bigger television audiences.
More social media engagement.
But commercial growth becomes much more tangible when companies are prepared to actually spend significant amounts of money to be associated with it.
A sponsorship deal is essentially a company saying:
We believe being connected to this audience is worth paying for.
And the amount it is willing to pay tells us something about how valuable it believes that audience could be.
That's why the reported size of this deal matters.
If women's football sponsorships begin reaching or surpassing some sponsorships in men's football, the commercial conversation around the women's game starts to change.
It becomes less about:
"Women's football is growing."
And increasingly about:
"Women's football is becoming a significant commercial market."
Nike is also getting in relatively early
There is another way of looking at this.
Nike isn't necessarily paying only for what London City Lionesses are worth today.
It can also be paying for what it believes they could be worth tomorrow.
That's common in growing markets.
If you believe an asset, company, sport or audience is going to become significantly more valuable, establishing a strong position before everybody else recognises that value can be very attractive.
Women's football is still developing commercially.
London City are still developing as a club.
Their international audience can still grow.
Their players can attract new supporters.
The WSL itself can become more valuable.
So Nike is attaching itself to that potential growth through a multi-year agreement.
It also creates a useful cycle for London City
This is where commercial growth can start feeding sporting growth.
London City invest in the team.
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Better and more famous players join.
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More people become interested in London City.
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The club becomes more attractive to sponsors.
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Sponsors provide more commercial revenue.
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The club has more resources to continue developing.
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The club becomes even more valuable.
That is the cycle football clubs ultimately want to create.
And it's particularly important for ambitious women's clubs because commercial income helps turn investment into a more sustainable business.
Simply having a wealthy owner continually putting money into a club isn't the same thing as building a club capable of generating significant revenue itself.
A deal like Nike's helps move London City further towards the second model.
There is something else important about this deal
Look at the company involved.
This isn't an unknown business trying to get cheap exposure.
It's Nike.
One of the world's largest and most recognisable sports brands.
That gives the partnership another form of value.
Nike's involvement effectively tells other companies:
We believe this is worth investing in.
That can help make the wider women's football sponsorship market more credible.
If one major brand demonstrates that it sees substantial commercial value in the space, other brands can start asking whether they are missing something.
And competition between brands is exactly what women's football needs if sponsorship values are going to continue rising.
Women's football is creating its own economy
This may ultimately be the most interesting part of the story for Pitchonomy.
Women's football doesn't necessarily have to replicate the economics of men's football exactly.
It can create its own sponsors, audiences, investors, media products, commercial partnerships and businesses.
London City are particularly interesting because their independence makes that easier to see.
There isn't a giant men's team sitting behind the story.
There is an investor putting capital into a women's football club.
There are major players joining it.
Those players bring talent, attention and audiences.
That attention attracts major commercial partners.
Those partners bring revenue.
And that revenue can help the club grow further.
That is an economy being built.
Nike isn't just sponsoring a football shirt
It would therefore be easy to look at the announcement and see:
Nike becomes London City Lionesses shirt sponsor.
But the bigger story is what sits underneath it.
A major global company has decided that the main sponsorship space belonging to an independent women's football club is valuable enough to make what the club says is a record investment for a women's team.
That tells us something about where women's football is heading.
Players are becoming more valuable.
Audiences are becoming more valuable.
Clubs are becoming more valuable.
And, as a result, the space around those clubs is becoming more valuable to businesses.
For years, women's football has been described as an opportunity waiting to be realised.
Deals like this suggest that companies are increasingly prepared to put serious money behind that belief.
And that is when growth stops being just a prediction.
It starts becoming an economy.