Denise O'Sullivan moves to England, as the Courage go younger
After eight seasons and 9 years with the Courage, Denise O’Sullivan moved to Liverpool on a transfer rumored to be for £300k. With her move, North Carolina loses their captain and one of their few remaining links to their past trophies. Ryan Williams is now the sole remaining rostered player from the 2018 and 2019 NWSL title teams, and Williams and Manaka Matsukubo (!) as their only remaining players from their 2023 Challenge-Cup-winning gameday 18.
There’s been some online chatter asking what the Courage are doing this offseason; “why aren’t they keeping players?”, “are they just too cheap?”, “what is the plan?”.
At this point, the plan seems pretty obvious.
A unifying theory of Courage moves: youth and age curves #
Looking over the past two years, if we were to divine a strategy that the Courage football operations department seems to follow, it would be this:
The Courage are strong believers in age curves, and are not willing to pay a premium for older players when younger ones have shown capability.
(A cynic might note that this is also a cheaper way to build a team, as yonger players won’t command the same salaries.)
What’s an age curve? #
In short, age curves describe how, on aggregate, players perform at different ages. They start out as youngsters with potential, peak through their mid-twenties, and almost universally decline once they reach their thirties. As managers are generally smart enough to notice performance, that maps nicely to the share of mintues played by players at certain ages.
Different positions and different skills have different age curves, often based on the breakdowns between athletic traits and learned expertise. For example, positions like wingers and skills like take-ons peak earlier, while centerbacks, goalkeepers, and things like pass completion percentage peaks later. But overall, most positions and most skils hit a drop-off once you get past 30. This all makes sense to those of us who have reached our thirties (and beyond!) while still hitting the rec fields.
You can read more detail on aging curves at Expecting Goals.
The upshot for a salary capped team is that committing contract term and significant dollars as players approach their 30s carries risk, and the Courage seem to be loath to take on that risk.
Where have we seen this happen? #
In 2024, they let Narumi walk, once they saw, in limited time, Riley Jackson could handle the role.
Meanwhile, so far in the year 2025, they have:
- let the 31-year old (and still productive) Kaleigh Kurtz sign for three years in Denver, turning over the team to players three (Natalie Jacobs) and six (Maycee Bell) years younger
- made ten external signings, with an average age of 22 years old
To this point, they have only signed two over-30 players.
Rather than compete with a 4 years, $1.5m contract offer for the 29-year old Casey Murphy, they only committed for two years, and certainly less money, to the 30-year-old Kailen Sheridan.
They also re-signed depth defensive midfielder Dani Weatherholt, who is one month younger than O’Sullivan. In retrospect, adding veteran midfield depth makes some sense if they knew O’Sullivan was moving on.
How O’Sullivan’s recent playing history fits in #
Here we’ll repeat a bit from our roster recap:
Denise O'Sullivan, despite missing a number of games with a MCL injury, was still a productive player for the Courage this year.
…
However, there is a trend with O'Sullivan's numbers over the past three years as she adds to her 14,000+ NWSL minutes. Her defensive contributions, while still good, have begun to drop off the past two years.
Metric 2021 2022 2023 2024 2025 Interrupting g+/96 0.08 0.05 0.07 0.07 0.07 Def. actions won/96 15.99 14.33 14.26 13.73 12.91 Aerial duel win % 41.7% 43.1% 47.4% 39.0% 34.5%
This also showed up in her performance with the team. On-off stats aren’t always the greatest indicator, but it’s notable that she’s gone from having a significant positive effect, to being more-or-less neutral the past two years.
| Year | % of minutes played | On-off xG±/90 |
|---|---|---|
| 2022 | 80% | +1.58 |
| 2023 | 90% | +1.12 |
| 2024 | 82% | -0.14 |
| 2025 | 64% | +0.01 |
A disturbing trend appeared in the Courage’s team defensive stats this year as well.
This season, when the Courage played with four at the back with O’Sullivan, they contested more often and higher up the field… and got absolutely wrecked down the middle and right flanks.
When O’Sullivan was out with her knee injury, they played deeper, and contested less aggressively, but were overall much better defensively.
So if you’re the Courage GM, and an offer comes in for O’Sullivan. You take into account:
- she will be entering her age 32 season
- her defensive numbers have started to dip a bit
- you have 8+ matches of evidence that a Jackson + Shinomi midfield can work
And your options are:
- let her move, and pocket a £300k transfer fee
- deny her the move, and play out 2026 with her possibly being disgruntled
- match her contract offer, signing her for more term and more money
What we’ve clearly seen from the Courage front office so far is that they’d rather move on from a player a year too soon than committing to a new long-term contract through the player’s 30s.
Plus, if a player wants to move, it doesn’t make sense to keep them.
In October, before an Ireland match, O’Sullivan talked about a potential England move.
I think the standards [at the Courage] are really, really high, so I get the most of myself there, but yeah, I think going to England has always been in the back of my mind and I think it still is in the back of my mind for sure.
The one thing North Carolina cannot offer O’Sullivan is the opportunity to play closer to home as she moves towards the twilight of her career. Given all that she has given the club, if she has asked for this move, it makes sense to grant it.
What this means for 2026 and beyond #
This closes a chapter in North Carolina. O’Sullivan finishes with three NWSL shields, two NWSL titles, and two Challenge Cups. From joining as a waiver claim in 2017, where her first goal sent the Courage to the NWSL final, to her final season coming back from injury to make a playoff push, she holds the team records for appearances and minutes played.
The Courage now turn to two twenty-year-olds. Riley Jackson is fresh off an extension that keeps her in North Carolina until 2028, while Shinomi Koyama is signed through 2027. Barring injury or a fancy new signing, it’s their show to run.
They are backed up by the aforementioned Weatherholt. There may still be be a depth signing of potentially a college player to round out the roster, especially as Ashley Sanchez’s contract is up at the end of the year.
As for the captaincy, the Courage now look to name only the third permanent captain in team history. Candidates include Jackson (who has captained the U-17 and U-23 national teams in the past) and the newly acquired Sheridan (who captained the Wave during her time there).
All that remains for O’Sullivan is to schedule her Ring of Honor induction, and to decide whether it’s #8 or #10 that will be raised into the stands. Meanwhile, in NC, the youth movement will continue.