Kyah Simon and Natasha Dowie will return to Boston in 2017

Kyah Simon and Natasha Dowie will return to the Boston Breakers in 2017, the club has announced.

Both players are going on loan to clubs in the Australian W-League for the NWSL offseason, Simon returning to Sydney FC and Dowie going to the Melbourne Victory.

Simon and Dowie were both key pieces in Matt Beard’s lineups in 2016. Simon logged 14 starts in 17 games for 1293 minutes, with one goal and one assist, despite an absence for the 2016 Olympics.

Tasha Dowie was a later addition who made an immediate impact, with seven starts in seven games for 605 minutes and three goals.

They continue a growing a tradition of NWSL players migrating down to Australia for the offseason, staying active with regular matches, getting paid, and skipping the Northern Hemisphere winter.

It’ll be interesting to see how Beard uses Simon on her return to Boston. Dowie will likely go right back to being the team’s premiere 9, but Simon was asked to drop deeper, sometimes very deep, for Boston, which sometimes hampered her effectiveness as a goalscorer. With the concurrent announcement from Katie Schoepfer today that the team did not exercise her contract option, it’s clear that the team’s roster adjustments have already begun.

Beard joined the Breakers in 2016 just before the college draft and didn’t really have a chance to fully put his stamp on the team. Between ‘16 and ‘17, Beard will now have a chance to rebuild the roster entirely according to his vision, assuming he gets that kind of freedom from GM Lee Billiard and the ownership.