Angel City FC selected 18-year-old phenom Alyssa Thompson with the No. 1 overall pick at the 2023 NWSL draft.
And as Thompson prepares for her first professional season, she is bringing her 17-year-old sister Gisele along for the ride.
A star in her own right at Harvard-Westlake Prep and in the U.S. youth soccer system, Gisele Thompson will join Angel City FC for training throughout the season, as will fellow teenager Mia Minestrella, the team announced Tuesday. Thompson and Minestrella both featured on Angel City FC’s preseason roster.
“I always have someone with me, and that’s Gisele,” Alyssa said of her younger sister last August. “When she’s gone, it’s kind of weird.”
The Thompson sisters took the soccer world by storm in 2022, starting in May, when the pair became the first high school athletes to sign an NIL deal with Nike.
Nike has signed sisters Alyssa & Gisele Thompson to multi-year deals. This marks Nike's first High School NIL deal.
— Just Women’s Sports (@justwsports) May 17, 2022
Both sisters are members of the US National Team system and are committed to @StanfordWSoccer
via @NickDePaula pic.twitter.com/NDyigwn4js
Elder sister Alyssa already has experience with the U.S. women’s national team, earning her first two caps last fall and making her debut at England’s Wembley Stadium, while Gisele played for the USYNT at the U-17 World Cup.
While both committed to play college soccer at Stanford, Alyssa decided to forgo her eligibility to play in the NWSL. But she isn’t leaving her younger sister behind.
“She is my role model,” Gisele said of her sister last April. “She always inspires me. She’s always working hard, we always train together. So whenever she does something, I also want to do something. I push myself as hard as she pushes herself so when I see her giving something her best, that’s how I want to be.”