Highly-Anticipated ‘Spicy' Romance Novel on Goodreads Gets TV Adaptation
There's a new heated rivalry coming to television screens, and while it's about athletes, hockey is not the name of the game this time around.
2023 romance novel Cleat Cute by Meryl Wilsner, which tells the story of two rival soccer players on the U.S. Women's National Team who face off for the same position, but get distracted by their growing attraction to each other, is being developed as a series by Amazon MGM.
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Deadline reports that the series Playing the Field will be an ensemble comedy about four players on a professional women's soccer team in New Orleans, anchored by the romantic back-and-forth of two players on the team, captain Grace Henderson and new upstart Phoebe Matthews.
Sarah Tapscott, who previously served as a co-producer on The Sex Lives of College Girls and worked on shows like Single Parents and New Girl, will serve as showrunner, executive producer, and writer. Retired WNBA player and five-time Olympic gold medalist Sue Bird and U.S. Women's National Soccer Team darling and retired professional soccer player Megan Rapinoe will produce through their company A Touch More.
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Wilsner will also executive produce the series, and took to Instagram to announce the news to fans, writing, "When I tell you this could not be in better hands, I mean it," sharing that "Everyone working on this project is fantastic."
When first published in September 2023, Cleat Cute was highly anticipated by fans of the genre on Goodreads, where the slow-boil romance was placed on the Readers' Most Anticipated September Romances list. With over 39,500 reviews on the bibliophile social media network, it has an average 3.7 out of five stars, where readers say it's fun, spicy, "steamy yet wholesome," and point out that while it's set in the soccer world, the sport is not a focal point.
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This story was originally published April 14, 2026 at 5:02 AM.