The US women’s national team may be the world champion after winning the Women’s World Cup this summer, but coach Jill Ellis knows a team is only as good as its last tournament. Her focus these days is on the 2016 Olympics in Rio, which are inching closer as qualifiers begin in February.

With four members of the World Cup-winning team retiring and the number of goalkeeper slots shrinking from three to two, Ellis doesn’t need to cut a single field player before the 2016 Olympics. If she wants to simply bring the rest of World Cup squad, she can.

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it, right? Not exactly.

“It’s not a matter of whether it’s broken,” Ellis told the Guardian this week. “It’s a matter of we’ve got to be better. It’s never sitting and thinking, OK, what we have is good enough.”

“We have to constantly be looking to improve. Is that new personnel? I don’t know,” she added. “That’s part of the process now that I’ll go through, but I’m not content to just be where we are.”

For the nine new players Ellis has called into national team camps since the World Cup, that’s probably music to their ears. Although roster requirements for the Olympics will force Ellis to whittle down her roster from 23 players to 18, the Olympics does call for four alternate players that will travel and train with the team in case of injury.

Of the new players Ellis has brought in recently for the team’s World Cup victory tour, all but one are under age 24. The US had the oldest team at the Women’s World Cup this summer with an average roster age of just over 29, but Ellis hints that she is looking for youth to develop in time for the next World Cup cycle.

“When you look at the Olympics next year, I think you can go one of two routes,” she said. “You can look at it as a standalone event. Or you can look at as the next major event before the next World Cup. We want to do very well at the Olympics, but the other part of it is looking at players who could be there for the next World Cup. It’s a balance.”

Much of that young talent will likely come from the National Women’s Soccer League, which is where all but one of Ellis’ World Cup-winning players competed on the club level. Five of Ellis’ nine new call-ups are with NWSL teams, with sources telling the Guardian that Lindsey Horan is close to leaving PSG to become the sixth.

An influx of players to the NWSL from overseas clubs over the past two years, including many who later made Ellis’ World Cup roster, raised questions about whether playing in the NWSL was a requirement from US Soccer, which founded and financially backs the NWSL. But Ellis, whose new call-ups also come from European clubs and college programs, has denied that is the case.

Assistant coach Tony Gustavsson is based in Sweden and scouts players in Europe, Ellis said. But she is clear that she feels a responsibility to help develop the domestic league.

“I’m not going to exclude someone from an evaluation because they’re playing overseas,” Ellis said. “My job is to bring in players I think can help this team regardless of where they’re playing. But I certainly do want to see our league become more and more important to the landscape.”

For the first time last week, Ellis and members of her staff met with representatives from each of the league’s 10 clubs at US Soccer headquarters. The meeting focused largely on performance components, like sports science and analysis tools, and Ellis said she also shared insight into what the national team wants out of new prospects.

The meeting was also a chance to create a two-way dialogue between the league’s clubs and the national team, Ellis added. She hopes to have similar conferences twice a year going forward.

“I said to the coaches, when I first got hired, all my focus was just on the World Cup,” she said. “I really didn’t look beyond picking a team. Now, it’s about putting some energy and commitment into making sure these NWSL coaches feel that I’m appreciative and supportive of what they do and the environments they’re creating.”

US Soccer’s relationship with the NWSL hasn’t always been perfectly in sync, however. When national team games are scheduled outside Fifa breaks, NWSL teams comply and release their players, but it’s disruptive. Ellis understands that and said she wants the relationship between the league and the national team to be mutually beneficial.

NWSL coaches are welcome to observe their players in national team camps and ask the national team coaching staff for feedback on what to work on with players, she said. Ellis is also open to hearing player recommendations for call-ups from clubs too.

The NWSL is largely seen as US Soccer’s answer to filling the development gap between the college and the national team, but players that excel in the league aren’t always called up to the national team. Ellis said it’s not because she isn’t paying attention.

“If you asked me about any player, I could give you an answer and information on them,” she said. “If I’m going to bring in new players, these are players I can see playing in 2019. We have a fantastic core group, so my responsibility is to look for players beyond 2016.”

Ellis likes what she sees coming down the pike. Jaelene Hinkle of the Western New York Flash is a left-footed left back, something the national team doesn’t have. Danielle Colaprico plays for the Chicago Red Stars as a holding midfielder, a position on the national team that has been filled mostly by natural attacking players.

Whether any of the young prospects from the NWSL and elsewhere can break into Ellis’ current roster of world champions remains to be seen. She will start with a 35-player provisional roster required by the International Olympic Committee and narrow it down to 18 from there.

“In terms of an Olympic roster, it almost comes down to mathematics – three center backs, three outside backs, three center mids,” Ellis said. “Versatility will come into play. It’s going to be ultra-competitive.”

NWSL notes and trade tidbits

● It’s no secret that players feel being in the US helps them get noticed by the national team and a source close to the league tells the Guardian that Lindsey Horan is close to joining the NWSL. The 21-year-old has played with Paris Saint-Germain since passing on a North Carolina scholarship to go professional out of high school in 2012.

Sources declined to speak to the Guardian on the record because the deal is not finalized, but said it appears Horan’s budding opportunities with the national team may be a factor in her decision to return stateside.

The Portland Thorns acquired Horan’s rights from Orlando in a blockbuster trade that sent Alex Morgan to the Florida expansion side. It is expected she would join the league full time, rather than on a short-term loan.

● The Portland Thorns, fresh off bringing in new coach Mark Parsons and the Morgan trade that triggered a rebuilding effort, are aggressively seeking players from overseas to overhaul their roster after missing playoffs.

A source tells the Guardian the club is in discussions with at least two high-profile international players from Europe and Asia. Ever since Spain’s Vero Boquete departed Portland for the Bundesliga, Portland has missed having a talismanic playmaker in the midfield and at least one of the players they are targeting is a No10.

American goalkeeper Adrianna Franch is also expected to make the move from Norway to Portland in a deal that is still pending, according to sources.

Franch had played for Western New York in 2013 and missed 2014 to injury, but spent the past year in Norway. The Orlando Pride, the NWSL’s newest expansion team, picked up her league rights, but with national team goalkeeper Ashlyn Harris as their clear starter, the club saw an opportunity to trade for more immediate needs, a source said. Sources declined to share the full terms of the deal.

Thorns goalkeeper Michelle Betos will remain in Portland with Franch and the two goalkeepers will likely compete for the starting spot, according to another source.

● The Boston Breakers made a controversial trade last week to send goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher to the Chicago Red Stars in exchange for defender Whitney Engen.

The trade upset longtime fans of the Breakers, who felt Naeher was the only bright spot in what was a particularly dismal season this year. But the Breakers finished the season with the worst goals-against average by a large margin, even as Naeher broke into the national team picture as the third-string goalkeeper.

Sources tell the Guardian that addressing of the defense has been No. 1 on new coach Matt Beard’s to-do list and Engen, a national team center back, is viewed as an anchor for the back line. The Breakers finished last season in last place.

Replacing Naeher is goalkeeper Libby Stout, an American who played under Beard with Liverpool LFC for the past two seasons. Last year, she was part of the Liverpool squad that won the FAWSL title.

● The Houston Dash, a club that narrowly missed the playoffs last season, made their first big acquisition of the season for talent outside the NWSL this week.

Stanford standout Chioma Ubogagu will head to Houston after a one season playing professionally with Arsenal. Though the Dash traded draft picks to Sky Blue on Wednesday for the rights to Ubogagu, her signing with the club is a formality, a source said.

The club is willing to give up more draft picks, including in the first round, to acquire proven talent, the source said. Additionally, the Dash are on the hunt for internationals to bolster the roster, specifically center backs and strikers, according to the source.