US Women’s Soccer - the most polarizing national team in history?
Maybe they are - but for all the right reasons
places listening USA - NYC specifically Manhattan followed by the Bronx both my a mile this week.
Austria and Australia were 2nd and 3rd - Graz Austria got all of their listens so hello to our friends in Graz
#1 and it’s not the topic of this podcast. I believe the USWNT deserves the same pay as the USMNT. But, that’s a whole different podcast, so all I want to do is state for the record, I think they should be paid equally for their training, appearances in friendlies and for their appearances in real competitions, such as the World Cup. (Bonuses for winning games and advancing and such, is also something we should all talk about on a different day as well)
US Team beat a hapless Thailand team 13-0 (the next biggest blowout in the group stage was Italy’s 5-0 win over Jamaica
Thailand shouldn’t have been in the tourney - but here’s the break down of the where the 24 teams came from
AFC (Asian Football Confederation) 5 slots (including Thailand) and Australia actually plays in the AFC
CAF (Africa) 3 slots
CONCACAF (N America) 3 slots
CONMEBOL (S America) 3 slots
OFC (Oceania) 1 slot New Zealand
UEFA (Europe) 8 slots + the host happens to be France so 9 slots
The Final 8 were the US and 7 European countries
The Final 16 were those 8 plus - 2 from Africa, 1 N Am, 3 Asia including Australia, 1 Europe, 1 South America
So, Europe had 9 teams in the tournament and 8 made the round of 16 and 7 made the final 8. So Unless they wanted to add a 10th European team to a 24 team tournament , Thailand had to get in — or somebody else like Thailand…
But Jamaica was rated worse than Thailand in the world rankings, as were all 3 African nations and 2 of the South American teams… but nobody beat those trams worse than 5-0. Teams exercised restraint in their dominance.
The USWNT Tried to destroy Chile - were up 3-0 and then the Chilean Goaltender started trending on twitter - because she stopped everything (including getting in the head of the Carli Lloyd for a PK at the end). Could’ve been 7-0 but only 3-mil - so the Chilean goalie took ‘em down a peg.
Third game against Sweden - won comfortably 2-0 against Sweden - all they needed was the win, final game of group stage. The control they played with against Sweden is the control they should’ve played with against Thailand. It could’ve been 8-0 and they would’ve proven the same point as 13-0.
My biggest problem was them celebrating goals 11, 12, & 13 as if they were each sudden death game winners in the world cup final.
They Showed up inferior players, the way an older sibling ruthlessly destroys their younger sibling. They punched down - and that’s a factor later in podcast
USWNT also struggled mightily with Spain. Spain played an incredibly physical game and dared the refs to call Penalty Kicks… and the refs did. Megan Rapione scored both kicks, and that was important, because Spain scored on some poor defense and goal tending by the US.
So the Mighty team that smoked Thailand, and tried to embarrass Chile, played safe vs Sweden and then was in a dog fight vs Spain. As the games get bigger and the teams get better, beating Thailand means less and less… but the bullseye you put on your own back isn’t going anywhere.
Now the US plays France in the quarters and France is great at home. US is the better team, but we shall see. Winner of this game is the favorite to win the World Cup.
But now politics come into play. Megan Rapione is very vocally opposed to the way the current administration is treating many of our citizens and many of the immigrants who are legally in the US, let alone how they’re treating folks at the border, people of certain religions, people of most races and ethnicities and the LBGTQ+ community.
So, the USWNT are saying they wouldn’t go to the the White House win or lose invited or not. And I feel like this is interesting because they are calling out an administration that makes a living out of “punching down”. The way we treat each other in this country and the way we treat people who are in at risk demographics is MUCH more important than how the USWNT played against Thailand … but ironically them being the “bully” to Thailand and taking joy in it… That’s right out of the playbook of this administration since it took power in January of 2017.
So here were go - there are 4 distinct schools of though on how people feel about the 2019 World Cup USWNT:
#1: Love that they beat Thailand 13-0, hate that they won’t go to the white house (Likely Moderate Republicans)
#2: Love that they Beat Thailand 13-0, love they they won’t go to the white house (Likely Libertarians)
#3: Hate that they Beat Thailand 13-0, love that they won’t go to the white house (Likely Far left Democrats, Green Party)
#4: Hate that they Beat Thailand 13-0, hate that they won’t go to the white house (I actually think this category may not exist in real life, but it’s plausible) Tea Party/ Fan Right folks aren’t very likely to watch soccer - cuz it’s for Sissies (so, i’ve been told)
But if we think about most of our national teams — we care about them as a nation, once every 3 to 4 years at best. The casual american non sports fans isn’t talking about them much. But, right now, they are — so whether or not this team is polarizing, people have an opinion — and that’s genius for a group that is trying to heighten awareness of the “equal pay movement”.
Crazy or Crazy like a fox - they’ve made the most of this world cup appearance, even if they lose to France. And if they keep winning - the snow ball of momentum is only going to grow.
But they’ve got to keep winning — so I hope they saved enough goals to eek out 3 more wins — cuz they certainly didn’t need all 13 they scored in game #1 - but i’m pulling for them to figure it out.