I see your Rapinoe and raise you Wayne Rooney. The greatest feat of athletic ability I’ll ever see in person. I was seated behind the goal and you see me briefly as the shortest man in MLS scores off a perfectly placed header as time expires. He then leaps into the crowd. Unbelievable vision and placement at a dead exhausted run after Rooney recognizes they will lose if he doesn’t get back and make a tackle to protect an open goal.
Yeah, the effort from Rooney was a breath of fresh air since you hardly ever see that type of effort given by aging players playing out the string. Watch Ronaldo play these days.
100%. I am flabbergasted by Rapinoe's miss because she has always been the one to take the ball and take PKs in the course of games the last few cycles and she has been money. Matter of fact the last time she took a PK and had it saved or missed was 5 years ago in an NWSL game. That's crazy. And honestly I think the moment got to Smith. My wife commented that she thought Smith looked nervous stepping to the spot. O'Hara's was just unlucky as she was going more for direction than power, fooled the GK, and just over did the push.
. Worst UWNT World Cup performance in history. Assume there will be a coaching change as well as roster moves. Time for a changing of the guard in US women’s soccer.
She made bag. She can buy purple hair dye till judgement day.
Dunn graduated from the University of Robbie Finley, College of First Touch, Gyasi Zardes, Department Chair.
Yeah, I don't think teams were super concentrated on Morgan. Smith, Williams and Rodman are by far the most dangerous attackers we have right now. Williams' pace gives backs nightmares. Smith is great on the ball but she holds onto it too long. I want to see more runs into space from her. And Morgan's timing was just a tad off, frequently getting caught offside but she has that instinct to see and go to the right places. Her finishing was the quality of a 10 year old told to only shoot with their off foot.
This is stupid. Even if you think the players are only in it for the money, which is ridiculous, they would make more if they kept winning. Not to mention the endorsement opportunities that are hurt by losing now. This loss cost the women a lot of money.
Interesting article on this. Takeaway, the US has already fallen behind in U20 development and that's working up to the entire US soccer program.
sports.yahoo.com
He's protecting his status with this interjection. The first comment alluding to this was more than enough. This is what, #3? He obviously wanted a reaction, or he wouldn't have kept 'slyly'(sarcasm intended) mentioning it.
You’re correct. I have no idea what I’m talking about when it comes to girls ECNL at clubs like FC Dallas or the role US Soccer plays in the same. Nor do I know anything about the club and private trainings which ECNL girls at those clubs attend.
This of course is what everyone of a certain political persuasion said in 2019 too and, yeah, so much for that argument. If anything, the opposite seems to be the case. A lot of the key contributors on this year's team are too young to have been involved with the prior round of social justice issues. This loss strongly indicates that the younger generation needs to find their issues that they can rally behind and push, or that we lack the kind of passion that leads one to be a killer on the field and in pursuing justice.
I 100% support the equal pay fight the women have undertaken. However, to suggest teams who are filled with outside distractions other than the sport they’re playing historically perform better than those focused solely on winning is unfounded.
Is it unfounded? I'm not aware of any analysis of that. I suspect that the type of distraction matters (e.g., Draymond Green/Jordan Poole is probably different than equality issues) but I don't know.
There’s a reason why coaches constantly preach to their teams to tune out outside distractions. To focus on the task of winning championships. Could they all be wrong….maybe. However, I’m willing to bet there’s something to what coaches preach.
Players have camps, foundations, businesses, families, charity partnerships, all kinds of outside distractions that coaches are fine with. Maybe certain kinds of distractions are bad but certainly not all. You say they're "filled with outside distractions" but I'm not even sure what this team had going on. They seemed pretty mellow and subdued.
Anytime a team underperforms as much as the USWNT did on the World Cup the lack of focus question will always be raised. Especially with teams who have dealing with issues and causes outside of their sport. It’s a valid question to ask.
Maybe if they concentrated on soccer and not “woke” issues like disrespecting our flag and national anthem, they would have done better. If you can’t be proud of the country you’re representing, then maybe you shouldn’t be representing us.
Bill, I like you and your insight on TU stuff but by "woke" and standing up for themselves you are showing your bigotry. You're asking them to not be themselves because you personally don't agree with their lifestyle and both Congress and state legislatures around the country have basically slammed certain members of the team because they are lesbians. It was the same for Kapernick and his protests because, as we've learned, this country still has a huge racism problem and the country sits idly by thinking "nothing to see here, everything is just fine" when it clearly is not and instead of facing issues head on, we (collectively) try to sweep them under the rug. For years the women on this team have had to fight the general public and assholes like Franklin Graham about who they are without enjoying the same protections the government gives to everyone else.
I didn't call you a racist. I did say you were bigoted. Using the term "woke" to describe someone simply for using their platform to bring attention to the injustices their particular group faces on a daily basis shows a bias against that group.
What indication is there that they haven't concentrated on soccer? You can have progressive values without being distracted. Has the team had walkouts or pickets or team press conferences or rallies? The 2019 team did and they won it all, so... facts? The "not concentrated on soccer" narrative has no factual support that I know of, but that doesn't stop the outrage herders from pushing it to the hungry masses they control.
The actual competitive reasons they lost have been talked about. Aging stars, the rapid improvement of other nations after their countries started investing more $ into their women's national teams (because nations like the US, Germany, France and other "woke" countries led the charge), injuries...and let's face it the ones the US had were not insignificant and forced them to play players out of position, and perhaps the coach is not the right coach for the job.
We didn’t just lose. We won one game in the World Cup. We scored one goal in our last three games. We can list our injuries and coaching as excuses but this team still grossly underperformed their talent level. Outside from our last game this group looked almost disinterested on the field at time imo. They certainly seemed to lack the passion one would come to expect from a team playing in the World Cup. There are a number of possible explanations. Truth be told it’s probably a combination of several. That said, I’m looking forward to a new group of US women representing the country over the next several years. I believe we have sufficient young talent to be the top team in the world. Yes…the world is or has largely caught up. Our development system needs to improve as is evidenced by our struggles in the younger age groups. US Soccer needs to step in and help with development of those potentially elite girls from less affluent backgrounds. Top level soccer shouldn’t be a game only for the well off. The boys side has solved that issue for the most part. The girls should follow their lead
