Scuffed | USMNT, World Cup, Yanks Abroad, futbol in America - #488: WoSo — Chelsea & PSG fall, no '27 WC, full NWSL rundown
Episode Date: May 2, 2024Tara and Vince captain the ship in Belz's absence. Full rundown of the action that matters for the U.S. Women's National Team.———Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon! Patrons get a private feed for t...he Monday Review, which is, among other things, a run-down of club action for national team players every week with Watke and Vince. We have recently added patron-only content that’s available every Friday. Patrons also get access to our private Discord server, live call-in shows, and the full catalog of historic recaps we've made: https://www.patreon.com/scuffed OTHER LINKSScuffed on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAoundrEkZUgZ13IE5XIqrg We’ve streamlined and revamped the merch we’re selling. Check it out: https://www.scuffedhq.com/store Scuffed on Discord: https://discord.gg/X6tfzkM8XU Skip the ads! Subscribe to Scuffed on Patreon and get all episodes ad-free, plus any bonus episodes. Patrons at $5 a month or more also get access to Clip Notes, a video of key moments on the field we discuss on the show, plus all patrons get access to our private Discord server, live call-in shows, and the full catalog of historic recaps we've made: https://www.patreon.com/scuffedAlso, check out Boots on the Ground, our USWNT-focused spinoff podcast headed up by Tara and Vince. They are cooking over there, you can listen here: https://boots-on-the-ground.simplecast.comAnd check out our MERCH, baby. We have better stuff than you might think: https://www.scuffedhq.com/store Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Welcome to the Scuff Podcast, where we talk about U.S. soccer.
All right.
Hello, everybody.
It's the Scuff Podcast.
Woso Wednesday.
Bells is out in Italy.
It's just me and Tara driving the boat for you today.
May 1st.
Summer is almost upon us, ladies and gentlemen.
Summer is almost upon us.
Tara, how you doing?
I'm good.
Happy May Day, Vince.
Happy May Day.
bells wherever you are right now. Happy May Day to everybody, International Labor Day.
Yeah, I'm good. I'm good. How are you? International Labor Day. I'm doing, I'm doing great.
Can't complain. Can I complain. So let's start off with some news. Terry, what do you got for?
I think we have a lot to talk about. There's a ton. It's just a few housekeeping things. It turns
out we're out of the running for the
2027 World Cup
and it seems like reports
are indicating that Brazil
is the front runner
and I'm just going to throw it out there
I think Marda bribed them
It's possible
I mean
I am happy
If it wasn't going to be us
I'm happy it's Brazil because I think
the time zones are going to be really complimentary
and there's not going to be any of those
like 3 a.m. start times.
I think Brazil has earned it.
Their women's team is very, very good,
and this will force, hopefully force,
some investment into the program.
Marta's a legend, and so on and so on.
But, you know, I'm sad.
I was hoping that we could have back-to-back World Cups.
I think that could have,
Incredible.
And, yeah, so we're out of the running.
I thought we get some of the bad news out of the way.
I don't know.
Yeah, for some reason, this didn't stink.
It didn't sting me.
Like, I was hoping.
I was hoping that we would have back-to-back-back World Cups, but I don't know.
Give my pockets some time to breathe.
You know what I'm saying?
Fair.
And maybe, you know, I could even pull up to Brazil.
You know, I got some, I got some people down there.
Really, really just two people.
Really just two people.
But, hey, it's more than one person, so I can say people.
Yeah, plural.
Yeah, it seems like it would be a good time.
Like you said, Brazil's on the come up, right?
I mean, not.
They've been here, you know.
Marta is old now on the verge of retirement.
But, yeah, Brazil's been here.
But also, they do have a very solid league, as you can see.
by the exports that they're sending to the NWSL straight out of Brazil.
They got a solid league and yeah, maybe that spotlight and everything that's coming towards
them can propel that thing up another level and maybe be the hub for all South American
players.
You know, they need a big league down there.
You know, Europe has their leagues.
We have NWSL.
South America needs one of those.
Yeah, my point was strictly forcing investment, not to say that they weren't already, already.
Oh, yeah, yeah.
But yeah, I'm strictly not, I'm strictly rooting for anybody but Netherlands.
So I guess I'm all in on Brazil.
I guess I'm all in.
And I have Mark to go out like that.
If it does, if it does happen that way, that'd be tremendous.
That be tremendous.
I think she's already said that she'll be retiring.
No. I don't know.
She always walks that back, though.
I was about saying, I mean, you get the World Cup.
You might have to.
But, yeah, so J.T. Batson, I think it was either was him directly or, you know, a statement from USS.
Said they're focusing on 2031 and the opportunity to get that World Cup, which I'll take it.
I'll take it.
I think they'll have some competition from Saudi, I want to say.
I'll say, sadly trying to get in the mix for that.
Yeah.
So, I mean, it's far from a done deal.
But, yeah, I'll take it.
2031, what Jaden Shaw will be,
2024, carry the one.
26, I mean, peak of our powers,
Jaden Shaw at home in the World Cup.
It's going to be beautiful.
It's going to be beautiful.
One more thing that I don't think we've talked about.
Audi Field.
getting a send-off match.
Yes. DC is going to be the goodbye game.
I think that that's a great, great exit.
I mean, Audi Field's not the greatest field,
but DC in general as the goodbye I really like.
Yeah, I haven't.
Are you going to go?
So it's either going to be that Mexico game in New Jersey at Red Bull Arena,
or this DC match, which now that I mentioned,
I think I have a meeting that day.
So if I'm going to pick one, it would definitely be the Red Bull match,
which I had no clue.
For some reason, it skipped my mind.
I did not know we were playing Mexico.
Like, I knew we were playing in Red Bull Arena in July.
I did not know we were playing Mexico.
So I think that just takes it up right there.
The opponent in D.C., Costa Rica, Tuesday, July 16th,
And yes, this will be the official send-off match.
Pretty cool.
Yeah.
I think Emma has four good opponents leading up to the Olympics.
Get a taste of multiple styles.
All right.
And then...
Okay.
You went ahead to Europe?
Let's get right into it.
Speaking of Emma, let's go ahead and transition.
Okay.
I want to start.
with the Chelsea game.
Chelsea lost to Barcelona in their final leg of the semifinals, two to nothing.
So Barcelona advances to the final.
I thought it was a really wild game.
There was an outlandish red card on Buchanan that I feel caused Caterina Baccario to be
pulled way too soon.
But Emma Hayes also had some thoughts on the red card.
which were in typical Emma Hayes fashion incredibly melodramatic.
But I want to read the quote because she's ours now.
So we go all in on these quotes now.
So Emma Hay said the Cadisha Buchanan Red Cardinal in the semi-final defeat by Barcelona was,
and I quote, the worst decision in women's champions league history, end quote.
Yeah.
She speaks her mind.
I mean, I haven't watched all, I can't say an act like I've watched all Women's Champions League matches.
You know what I'm saying?
But it was a very bad call.
It was, I mean, she's not wrong.
It was a very, very bad call.
But the bluntness of saying it was the worst call in the history of this tournament, I appreciate it.
Well, you got to turn it up.
You got to turn that one time.
Did you see the video of the center round?
the center referee.
She was kind of getting overcome by emotions at some point.
It looked like she was, I saw, I saw people, like, kind of accusing her of, like, laughing about it.
I thought she was crying about it.
I thought she looked like she was about to cry.
I mean, I don't want to cast any, you know, have those people that said that she was
smiling been around a woman in their life.
That's all I'm asking.
No, she was going to cry.
She was going to cry.
I mean, I don't see how you.
take that video and get that from that.
But that's a
trust you, but anyway, it was
a great crowd. They played at
Stanford Bridge.
Yeah, it was Emma's last Stanford Bridge
game.
She got a sell out, which I
thought was wonderful.
I thought Cap played really
well for what she gets, 63
minutes. What did you think?
I thought she was quite excellent, especially
compared to the rest of her
team, which just did not necessarily see.
seemed to be at the races.
Yeah.
She was great, but for the most part, very assured.
You know, she got a lot of touches coming back in the midfield,
was able to hold up the ball well, and really created Chelsea's best chances in the match.
31st minute, she pounced on a ball that was poked away from Lauren James,
who was very disappointed, extremely disappointed.
I mean, I thought she was very poor this game.
So cat runs onto the ball and plays James to the inline, which she did play this cutback.
She got onto the ball, played the cutback that led to a Chelsea shot that rang off the crossbar.
Big chance, big chance.
If you looked at a cat was already celebrating, it was like, ah.
And then also, I think most people probably have seen this.
just a beautiful shot with their left foot that she took off the volley off of just a cleared
ball that just bounced outside the box.
She just smacked that thing.
Left footed was going far post, took a brilliant right-handed diving save from the Barcelona
keeper to deny the goal.
That thing was definitely on frame, definitely going in.
A little bit of heroics from Barcelona.
are there.
But yeah, Cat was a
Chelsea's most dangerous
player and they were
mostly listless. I mean, if they didn't have cat, it
would have been
it would have been worse than it was.
But yeah, a very
encouraging performance from Kat.
Very, very encouraging.
Yeah. I wanted to stick with Kat
for a second.
Just because she's been building
her minutes back up a bit.
And like
you said, I think her game was
significantly better than Lauren James.
But stepping away from this semifinal for a second,
I wanted to give a little bit of an update on her minutes situation
because I keep getting the sense that with her long injury,
we're assuming we have to keep being very careful with her forever.
But Emma Hayes has let the brakes off of her a bit as of late.
So she got 63 minutes this weekend in the second leg of the semifinals.
She got 20 minutes the week prior in the first leg.
And then three days before the first leg, she got 70 minutes plus extra time as well.
So I just bring it up to be, I just bring it up to say the Europe schedule is wrapping up.
She's got four games left with Chelsea, including one today at 2 p.m. against Liverpool.
I think she's going to keep building her minutes.
And we've got camps in June and July.
And I just want to start advocating to kind of stop viewing her as our broken little toy.
And I think I kind of need your help here.
I mean, do you remember how fun those camps were?
there weren't that many of them,
but when we had Mao, Kat, and Sof, all together.
I mean, it was looking like Vlachobal was going to be something.
You know what I'm saying?
He had it together.
He had it together.
It was just a little bit, but he had it.
He had it together, man.
I mean, what was it?
We played Uzbekistan.
That's something in one of those cats?
That was one of them.
But, yeah, we were looking coherent.
We looked like we had a pulse.
We were looking fluid.
You know what I'm saying?
We were creating chances through the middle.
So, yeah, Kat's a big time player.
And yeah, the training was coming off.
And another thing, Emma knows what she's doing.
Even knows what she's doing, you know what I'm saying?
She knew exactly the right time in which she had to ramp cat up
because, you know, she's, of course, taking Kat with her once she leaves Chelsea.
So she's two starts under her belt now, already got over 60 and 70 minutes.
We've got four more games.
I think by June camp, we should be expecting starts.
Fair enough.
Yeah.
Ready, rock and roll.
I'll take it.
Okay.
PSG lost to Leon one to two.
I do not think it was a particularly good game from Eva.
And Corbyn came in in the 84th minute.
And by that time, it was kind of written in the stars.
The final will be Barcelona versus Leone,
and it's going to be a rematch for our captain,
Lindsay Horan.
Yeah, I was about to say,
what did you make of this?
Do they call this something?
Like, you know what I'm saying?
This needs to be the classic cae.
You know what I'm saying?
The classic colonel of mensa, you know what I'm saying?
I'm sure that there is a name for it.
I just do not know what it is.
Yeah, so I went ahead and watched,
because I hadn't watched too much of Eva Gaetino.
which, you know, she kind of popped on, she kind of did, like, pop on the scene.
I don't know, like, like, we knew who she was just because of following youth teams and stuff like that.
But number one, I had never been, like, too, too impressed.
And, yeah, and number two, I just didn't know that, you know, she was going to leave Notre Dame and then eventually find herself starting for PSG.
And that is exactly what she's doing.
and Tara, you are right as far as this second leg.
She wasn't particularly good.
She was much better in the first leg, in my opinion.
But yeah, she had some mistakes.
Let's see, I think the biggest one, the biggest one was basically letting a ball bounce over ahead
and letting Milky Dumay run onto it, leaving her one V1 with the keeper.
The save was made.
There wasn't too much egg on Iva's face.
But it was Lindsey Horan and somebody else from PSG going up for an aerial duel.
They both missed the ball completely.
The ball hits the ground.
You know, I wasn't necessarily expecting that ball hits the ground.
Yeah, it just pops right over.
And then she got caught in possession in the 65th minute.
that led the two big chances from Leon that were both saved too.
But and on the winning goal for Leon, I think she probably should have been aware of
Melki coming on that rebound just because of the fact that she had chased her up into the hole earlier.
You know, she received, Malcolm receives a ball, lays it off and then gets on her horse and starts running.
And yeah, that's your mark.
That's your mark, either.
But, yeah.
So this was a little bit of a rough one, a little bit of a rough one.
But I will say, after watching these two games and getting like a little bit more familiar with their match, I'm excited.
I'm excited.
I think she is, I think she already is a good player, despite, you know, I mean, great players have gotten the fist put on them by Leon before, you know.
Yeah.
So, but yeah, I just want to, I just want to.
really make the point that I do think she is a top talent.
You know what I'm saying?
She's a large human, pretty fluid in space.
A solid quickness in short spaces, I saw that Leon tried to run.
She's playing middle centerback in a back in a back three.
And I've seen multiple times where Leon tried to run off her, try to use Melki,
just do one of those little
those little into outruns
where you're in the middle
try to run the channel a little bit
and for the most part
Eva stays with her.
And she's been
able to show a nice bit of passing
balls
on the ground
into the amoeba
and especially once
PSG
went down to one.
I mean she just started spraying that thing everywhere.
Right foot, left foot,
But I was cool to see.
I think she's a pretty good prospect.
And, yeah, one that, I assume we'll, well, I guess I can't be making assumptions.
But I do think we'll probably see her, probably be seeing her in Paris with the way our centerback.
I got to say, I got to say I would be coming into this game completely different if two of our centerbacks weren't hurt right now.
I would say it was really promising,
and I think that it's going to be,
I think it's going to be really good
once she gets more than one season under her belt.
But with two centerbacks hurt right now,
I felt a little different about this game.
Yeah, any urgency.
Understood.
Yeah.
That's fair.
But I would say, you know,
the first leg was good.
The first leg was good.
I thought the first leg was good, too,
until Leon got, what, three goals in 10 minutes?
Yeah.
Yeah, which Corbin and Eva have totally flipped roles.
You know what I'm saying?
Yeah.
Corbin is riding that bench.
Corbin for the most part.
And Eva's starting every match.
So.
Yeah.
I mean, I'm thrilled she's getting the minutes and it's only going to help her game.
I think PSG only has three games left in the season.
But we'll see what's going on with Eva, and I'm going to keep watching.
But I did want to bring up an interesting fact I learned about Lindsay.
I saw online.
Lindsay Horan covered the most distance in the Women's Champions League out of everybody.
Isn't that shocking?
It is pretty shocking.
Congratulations, Lindsay Horan.
Congratulations.
I mean, like we talked about last episode, that KT tape came off and, you know, new knee, new me.
You know what I'm saying?
I'm proud of her.
I'm proud of her.
I'm still skeptical that K2 tape is actually off.
I think maybe they just got new shades.
New shades, but we'll see.
We'll see in June.
They became one.
The KT tape.
Okay, so the final, the Champions League final is going to be May 25th.
I will, of course, be supporting Lindsay Horan in Lyon, but even more fiercely after watching the semi-final against Chelsea.
Barcelona got so many calls awarded to them.
I won't stand for it, and I know Lindsay Horan will not stand for it either.
So I think it's going to be a really fun game.
Um, okay.
NWSL time.
NWSL time.
First game was Spirit versus Pride,
Spirit loss,
two to three.
What did you see?
Yeah, just the fact that,
uh,
Corey Bethune is,
is the truth.
You know, I mean,
at this point,
you know,
uh,
were six games through,
five games?
Whatever.
Five.
Five games.
And she's been,
outstanding and every single one of them.
It's time to get it integrated.
She's earned a call up.
The fact that we don't, even with Rose back,
we do not have a clear backup 10, in my opinion.
Like, you know, it's Jayden Shaw for me and everybody else gets to fight it out.
You know, Rose has had opportunities.
You know, in the Gold Cup, whatever, where she has just flattered, I mean, flattered to the sieve.
Is that the, is that the, she hasn't been good.
All right.
She hasn't been good, damn it.
All right.
She ain't been good.
Now, she hasn't been playing in the true 10 roles.
She was playing like inverted winger, whatever.
Now, maybe we give her another shot and her just playing the 10 and we'll see how it works out.
But for me, I'm going on Corey first.
had had that insane goal against Gotham on uh was it on 420 i think yeah where she would
receive the ball left half space i mean receives that thing turned and skips by a gotham center
back in just one fluid motion unbelievable unbelievable agility unbelievable just sauce bro just
just beautiful and then uh ripped that left footed shot that just snuck in near post like a
you don't see those often, like a bender that just hits near post.
It was beautiful, beautiful.
Yeah, it really was.
And then an equally good assist in this match against the pride,
won the ball off of Emily Sams,
which is one thing that I had been watching for with Croix,
just to see where her defensive game is.
And she did some ball winning a couple times in this match.
So that's, I was encouraging.
wins the ball off Emily Sams
takes a few touches
to her right while Emily Sams are still trying to get at her.
Croyd really just
fended her off with her left arm,
no issue, and played just a beautiful
inch-perfect through ball to Sarr
set her in 1V1 with the keeper.
And Sarr just inspired by Croyce.
She just said, let me go ahead and chip this thing.
Beautiful chip.
You know, there's two different types of chips, right?
There's just the one that does, like, just what it needs to do.
And then there's the moon shots.
This one was the moonshot variety.
Beautiful goal.
But yeah, Croix keeps cooking.
I think she set up, I want to say she set up Trinity again in this match.
And Trinity did not finish, which it is what it is.
Trinity has been very good.
She just needs to.
Trinity has been amazing.
this season. It's fine.
She just needs it. Once she gets her finishing boots
on, it's going to be
even more scary for the league.
But yeah,
Croy is,
she's incredible and
I'm very curious
when she gets integrated
into the national team. Because
I think it is a win and not an if
only because
of that
position. I mean,
with cats, the way that cat plays striker, it really is more of a ten.
Like, she really falls back that deep.
Jaden has proven that I believe Jaden has proven that that is where she thrives behind our forwards.
I think that's where she belongs.
I just, I wonder if they will try her, meaning Croy,
somewhere else. I wonder if
she really will just be a backup for a little bit, which is fine. We need to
build our bench backup.
Yeah, I'm just curious about that.
Sticking with the Spirit game,
I did think it was another solid Trinity performance.
I just want to hammer home again how much
I think Casey Krueger needs to be on the Olympic roster.
As we get into these games, you're going to hear about
injuries or inconsistencies, and Casey is someone who, again, for the spirit, as well as for the national team, is playing fullback and centerback and has been one of the better defenders in the league.
So please, somebody, somebody believe in her.
I'm desperate.
Yeah, and this is truly kind of like probably her last rock.
Yeah, I'm saying.
It is.
It is.
Like, she's 34, I want to say.
Mm-hmm.
It's not like she's falling off that much.
Right.
And if there was a better defender out there,
I would bring her over Casey Krueger,
but there is it right now.
Yeah, it's time to, it's time to go ahead and do that.
I would love to see it.
And, you know, we'll get to another versatile player.
who got spun around like a top this weekend.
But, uh,
let's go to move on, uh, what, Angel City, Kansas City, Kansas City won this one.
Kansas City won this one, uh, 3-1.
Yeah, Angel City, Angel City kept the tight.
And then what, 80th minute, they just got too tired.
I mean, Casey's just so nice.
Like, I mean, they are.
Bia and Chawahua.
Chowinga.
Bia and Chowinga are just incredible.
Incredible.
They're the best pair of forwards in the league for my money.
It's the fact they can hold up any ball.
You know, they can both front and behind.
They can both playmake.
Like, it's just, you got a deal.
I mean, like, Bia was out by the time, you know, Kansas City scored their two goals or whatever and pulled away.
But it's still the fact that you're going to have to deal with at least one of them for 90 minutes.
and both of them for, you know, 70 minutes, you know, it's just, it is a task.
You know what I'm saying?
And Vlako, I'm not putting no respect on your name Vlako, probably ever.
But, hey, NWSL is his bag.
Yeah, no, he's doing something.
You want to start with Claire?
Yeah, yeah, I'll go ahead and do that.
Yeah, just another.
good game from Claire Hutton.
She just puts in solid performance after solid performance.
And the thing is, is she is, Locke's putting a lot of responsibility on her, right?
Being a pivot for any team is just, it's something we don't talk about enough.
It's one of the, it's one of the most important positions, number one, and just the burden
that is put on you is, it's humongous as far as, you know,
You're the key to the first and second phases of progression, of building out.
One thing I noticed, another thing for Claire is just she's the key to Kansas City's counterpress.
Like if you ever see a Kansas City attack break down, like, I mean, you can count to one.
And then all of a sudden you see Claire just flying in, flying into whoever, whoever has the ball that's looking for an outlet pass or whatever.
Like Claire is coming.
she's coming with bad intentions
and she's mostly on time
there was one time she got beat in this exact
situation it was actually Kennedy Fuller
where Claire kind of took a bad angle
and Kennedy got on her
horse and started carrying out the field
and Claire had to take a yellow
but most of the time she's
there she's on time she's poking the ball away
she's regaining possession
and yeah, I'm just, I just continue to be impressed with the way that she plays.
She did not have any cool turns in this match.
Unfortunately, I guess she's just saving them for Gotham and when she's at the crib surrounded by.
What, the 800 people pulling up with 800 people pulling up or whatever?
Yeah.
Did I hype that?
What was it?
How many people was it?
It was at least 400.
Yeah, okay.
So, yeah, maybe, maybe, you know, when she's just gas that much, that's when she starts acting out of character.
But, yeah, she's just very good.
I mean, when we talk about our 2013 World Cup hopes at home, Claire Hutton, Ad the Six.
Yeah.
Yeah.
I can see it.
World Cup final in MetLife, you know, she's going to have 80,000 people there.
Just doing all those weird cool turns.
Yeah, I agree.
I just really enjoy watching her grow into this league.
I saw some journalists starting to talk about rookie of the year options,
and Claire wasn't on that list.
And I thought it was outrageous.
I mean, the starting defensive midfielder on the best.
team in the league.
She's going against
forwards
like Sophia Smith,
like Jaden Shaw,
like Alex Morgan,
like at the time,
Mitch Purse.
She's doing very, very well.
And I think
she's one to watch every single week.
Yeah.
Also, just real quick.
Yeah, go ahead.
The one time that I will put
some respect on Black Coe's name
is when Claire actually becomes, you know, a world class six.
You know, once we get that point, I'd have to be like, you know what, Black Coe, damn it, you done, did it.
This man built a Juilliardt, who really did?
Yeah, yeah.
So, yeah, I mean, you just need to watch.
Watch our progression every week.
I'm having a great time.
Black Coe seems to know what he's doing after not knowing what he was doing regarding young players.
the women's national team.
Forever.
Anyway,
we'll leave our Black Co alone.
Keep doing your thing, bro.
It's beautiful.
Yeah.
But in this game,
I'd be remiss not to mention
Alyssa Thompson's up to two assists now.
She's loosening back up.
I saw a quote from her coach
that I think put it quite nicely,
even though I kind of hate Becky Tweed.
As a coach,
She said, last year was a whirlwind of a year for her as a rookie.
I want to take that pressure off of her and give her that love of the game.
So Alyssa, Alyssa has gotten two assists on Claire Impley goals.
Yeah.
I never would have thought Claire Impley would be up to four goals by now, but that's where we are.
She's turning up.
She was waiting for me to call her ass on the Discord.
Because for whatever, like, I knew, she had a good season last year.
Like, she's been a productive NWSL player.
Yeah.
For whatever reason, I just don't like her brand of ball.
It's just her, taking a lot of touches, just herky jerky, not doing too much.
But this year, she's doing a lot.
I got to, I got to reevaluate.
This last assist, I thought, was really lovely.
It was just, she just saw a window and she got a through ball right into Claire's feet.
goal.
So I'm happy for Alyssa and I wanted to burn it out.
Yeah, also she, the burst is back, I think.
Just if you saw that run where she won the foul that Emsley scored off of last week,
but like not this past weekend, but the game before that, the Emsley free kick,
the one that she won at the top of the box where, you know,
Alyssa is making an out-to-end run from the left.
wing and just turn on them burners and it was she was going to be in on goal if uh whoever that was
hadn't taken her out so uh yeah everything's everything seems to be back to normal for alissa
and that that is one thing i did kind of want to bring up um with regards to kroy and maybe if we
call her up with kroy's injury history i don't know it it does seem it's hard right when like
all of a sudden you're going to put this load
onto players when they didn't have that load previously.
Like, okay, you're going through your first NWSL season already.
Now, let me give you this full U.S. women's national team load too.
And I do kind of worry about that.
For the young people, for the first year pros,
it's always in the back of my mind.
And you've seen it with Alyssa.
You've seen it with Jaden at the beginning of the season.
Yeah.
So I don't know.
If I was coaching Alyssa Thompson or any young winger or any young attacker, I guess to be more open about it, I would have, I would really have them look at Mal Pugh's history, Mow Swanson's history.
it took her time to build up.
It took her time to build up.
She was dropped from rosters.
She was a bench player.
She was a starter.
She didn't make big rosters.
She was transferred.
And then look at her.
She's a star player at 25.
These things take time.
And I think that is something that our program
is very good at is
investing
in young talent
even if it takes a few years.
One more thing from this match.
Kennedy Fuller.
Kennedy Fuller started again.
I think that's three starts maybe
in five games, I want to say.
Something like that.
But that sounds right.
I think in none of these games
has she been particularly impressed.
but it's okay you know she's not she's not clare hudden level she's not it doesn't seem to be like
riley jackson level i do i do think she's like a different kind of player almost like maybe like an
attack in mid uh winger type it seems to be a little bit more physical you know like like i said
when she burned i can see that burn claire on the carry like she had a couple nice carries in this
match. Final product was just absolutely
terrible. A lot of times she was playing through
trying to play through balls and they just would
roll to the keeper and not even be in like the right
windows, you know, to play Sidney LaRue in, etc., etc.
But...
Their whole final product, aside from
Claire and Slee is lacking right now, but
there was one, there's only one
Kennedy Fuller play that I remember.
and it was Michelle Cooper absolutely wiping her out for some reason.
And then she hit the crossbar right after that.
So I enjoyed her being fueled by rage.
But that is the only play I remember.
So I'm not disagreeing with you.
I just I remembered Cooper wiping her out and thinking that that was outrageous of her.
She didn't get carded for that, I don't think.
But yeah, I mean, I'm still watching Fuller,
but I in no way disagree with you that she's not Claire Hodden-Levela yet.
Yeah, I mean, and she's like a year younger, too.
She's 17, I want to say.
Yeah, yeah, she's still a different class anyway.
Yeah, so, okay, next match.
North Carolina courage is Seattle rain.
North Carolina continues their hot start to the season
with a one-nill win over the rain.
And the rain.
The rain continue there.
I mean, just terrible.
Imagine if we had a...
Plummeting.
I'm forgetting her name.
I can picture her face.
What's...
Harvey.
Laura Harvey.
Imagine if we had Laura Harvey as a coach.
Nope.
Not over here, buddy.
We only get the best of the best.
We don't got time for no malarkey.
Anyway.
Another Ashley Sanchez assist.
How are you feeling about it?
Ashley Sanchez assist
and North Carolina
doesn't even have
you know, the big goal scores
and she's still getting all these assists.
Yeah, that
it's a big deal.
It is a big deal.
It is a big deal.
Right now, she's second on my
second on my trial list.
Well, I guess it wouldn't be a tryout anymore.
Well, fair to, I'm a new coach.
Yeah, yeah, we'll call them tryouts.
I think
I think it's trial because it's
Sean Nejas.
Ashley Sanchez. It's a new Ashner's
Understood. Yeah, yeah. I'll
take that. I think she's behind
Croy for me. Quorae has a little bit
more juice in the attack
as it stands as it stands right now.
Ashley is absolutely cooking.
Do not get me wrong.
Do not get me wrong. Ashley is absolutely
cooking. I'm putting respect on Ashley.
Like I said last episode.
But when you look at
when you look at Croy, you look at Ashley,
I mean, I was looking at this on FB Ref.
Shout out sponsor of the pod football reference.
I was looking at this yesterday.
Croy has over one non-penity XG plus XA
in like three of the five matches that she's played.
Like she's in like 1.2, 1.3 range.
And then in one of the matches where she didn't have over one combined XG and XA
was the Gotham goal
where she just scored
that ridiculous goal.
You know,
like,
Croix is really just putting on.
But, yeah.
I think,
I think I'm reversing that
for the Olympics
and then reversing that again
after the Olympics.
So I think I'm with you,
Croy ahead of Ashley
after the Olympics.
After,
so for the Olympics,
Ashley's ahead of Croy,
is of she?
If something were to happen,
only because she's played with these players before.
Fair enough.
I just...
My main thing is the way Ashley's cooking,
she's cooking in a way, it's not tennis.
It's...
She's very much playing as a midfielder.
And...
Yeah.
I don't know.
It's just...
It's not like popping up in the middle,
playing a sexy through ball
and like somebody's scoring.
It's just, she's just being inventive
in a lot of different ways.
And that's just where I'm falling on it right now
between Corey and Ashley.
And, you know, it's splitting hairs.
It's splitting hairs.
Yeah.
Honestly, I think we could probably use them both,
but we're not going to drop that many players.
So,
listen,
somebody in Seattle,
had an outrageous performance as well.
I mean, look, Alana Cook.
Alana Cook's been pissing me off all year.
I forgot who Rain played Red Stars, yes.
Played the Red Stars the last week,
and Alana was just absolutely terrible.
Terrible in that match.
Do you think it's the entry?
Do you think it's coming back from the entry?
You know what?
at this point, maybe.
Sure.
You know, like, like whatever excuse you want to give me, I'll take it.
Because this, this, what I'm seeing is worrying.
I just, I don't know what else to say about it.
Yeah.
It's, it is not good.
Not good whatsoever.
I mean, just making terrible play.
I mean, just any type of play.
Terrible plays with the ball.
Terrible plays without the ball.
getting ran past, getting beaten the air,
like any type of way that she can mess up,
she's been messing up.
And that is just, you know,
she's always had a little, a little, yeah,
a little oopsie in her.
But I mean, shit.
We see an oopsies.
Too many oopsies.
Too many oopsies.
And so one thing I didn't want to highlight with the rain real quick is,
I don't know how to pronounce her last name.
I think it's Adams.
Emery Adams.
Adams?
Adonnes.
Adam.
Okay.
She was in that,
she was in that Pan America team with Hutton.
Okay.
She,
did she get an assist?
I think she might have gotten an assist against the Red Star.
Yeah, she did get an,
she did get an assist.
I believe she.
Hold on.
No, she didn't.
No, she didn't.
I can check right now.
But,
but she, she did, she, she was all right.
She's an 18 year old, uh, winger.
started for the rain against the Red Stars
and played all right in that match.
I think it's fine.
I mean, this is bottom of the team, Seattle Rain.
She's got big shoes to fill.
Everybody left this team.
Megan Rapino, Roosevelt.
Who else left?
I mean, those are the big ones.
Those are the big ones.
Bottom of the table right now, Seattle Rain.
horrible.
Yeah.
And, you know,
one thing I do,
another thing I would like to say
about the rain.
I don't know why the hell
we bought Sophia where to the World Cup.
Well, why did she even get that run
that she had?
You know what I'm saying?
I would like for us to stay away
from mid fullbacks
in the cycle if we can.
Jenna and I swangor,
I got my eye on you.
I'm not saying you mid.
I'm not saying you mid.
You're just.
Just a cute story of it, though.
I'm putting her on mid-watch.
That's all what I'm saying.
I'm putting her on mid-watch, okay?
Okay.
You know, doing whatever we were doing.
I mean, she is quite slow.
She is quite slow.
Jenna, yes, yes.
But yeah, we need to just go ahead and get away from that.
Yeah.
But that's all.
We have talked about the Seattle rain absolutely too much.
Okay.
I'd love to hear your thoughts on this next game.
Chicago.
So.
Terrell, real quick.
You're going to talk about rain?
North Carolina.
North Carolina.
Okay.
How do you thought about Malia Berkeley?
Almost no thoughts at all.
All right, fair.
We're going to have to do a little centerback round.
You know who I do?
You know who I do love?
Ryan Williams.
Yeah, I don't got no thoughts on Ryan Williams either.
I don't know if that's right
Okay
Well, we can just have a specific North Carolina pod one day
And then
Bells can get really mad at us
Okay, Chicago Portland
Let's do it
Okay
Chicago lost two to nothing
It seemed like Sophia just had a big old grudge against Alyssa Neyer
What did you think?
Yeah
I mean, Sof keeps backing goals.
You know what I'm saying?
And you said, you said Kansas City had the best forwards in the league,
and Sophia's the golden bootleader, so I'd love to hear your thoughts.
I mean, come on.
Sof is one person.
Sof is one person.
You know what I'm saying?
I mean, she needs an equal SOF level talent next to her to be in that race.
You know what I'm saying?
All due respect to Morgan Weaver.
but, you know, she's not, she's not Chawinga, nor be a, unfortunately.
But, yeah, so doing her thing, Ed Stryker is showing why, to me, that she is just a striker.
When you see, when you see the way that she's, whether she's making these runs, the way that she's finishing, that is, that is her position.
The first goal I'm partial to the defending wasn't even bad.
I mean, Chicago's on a decent run this year.
One defender was tracking Sophia near the outside of the box.
Another defender is closing an owner and she finds just a little window between both defenders
and she gets an incredible shot on goal.
And I loved it.
I've been really intrigued by these past few games of Portland since they switch coaches around since the bad coach went over to the technical office or whatever they called it.
The not firing of the coach.
They just moved them around.
And like you said, we've been talking.
talking about this for a while. It's nearly beating a dead horse. Sophia Stryker versus does she
need to just be better as a wide forward talk? So this in Portland, they've even had Christine
Sinclair centrally at times. But the difference is Christine Sinclair can move around. Even
very, very old Christine Sinclair can move with Sophia Smith.
And that's what's missing with the national team.
Mm.
Is it not?
Well, I mean, what's missing is, is,
sof's just not playing in a position for the most part.
But, but, so what are you saying, like, like, what are you saying that Sinclair
brings with her movement to, to Sophe?
Is somebody they play with, play off of?
Somebody to play off of, and if Sinclair is centrally, she'll move out of the way for Sof to cut inside.
Alex doesn't do that.
Understood.
Do you disagree?
No, I don't disagree.
Because it sounds like you do.
No, no, I don't disagree.
So I see what you're saying, just as far as, yeah, those days where, you know, Alex could do a job out on the wing are long.
long gone, long behind her.
I mean, not even just being out on the wing permanently,
just even rotating out there, receiving the ball, doing something.
Yeah, it's a wrap.
And the difference is we could very well see a lineup for the national team
where Sophia's out wide again, but Kat starts centrally.
And that's not going to be the same at all.
Right.
As.
Correct.
Because Kat's going to be.
dropping real, real low.
And that still means
Mal and Sof
as central as they want to be.
Yeah. Yeah, that's fair.
But also
it's just
Sof can be wide, but I feel like
we got just two
excellent
wide forwards,
you know, and
whoever you want to call it, you know,
Mao, we got Mal, we got
Tren,
there's just no need to have
to have self out there no more.
She just, she don't look comfy,
she just doesn't look comfy when she's out there.
And my thing about, like, watching her play striker
and score these goals, you can see she,
she's looking very comfy.
Yeah, yeah.
Okay, well, she's now at five goals for the season,
the most of any player,
which I think is,
really impressive when you remember how terrible her team has been the start of this season.
So that's all I have for Portland.
The week prior, we got our first Maltry goal.
It came from a Sophia assist.
But, you know, that was last week.
We can't look backwards, only forwards.
Yeah.
I'm happy Maltrow got that goal.
I was going to fire something nasty up.
Yeah.
But once again, right?
Another example of, you know, putting a young player in this position to where, you know,
you get to the national team callups, gold cup, got a little banged up at the gold cup,
all this different types of things, adding that additional load.
You know, that's another example.
Slowed them down.
Okay.
I want to spend two seconds on Utah, if you don't mind.
Okay.
Utah, Houston, zero.
I don't need hardly any time.
I just wanted to highlight, Utah has recently brought in some additional players,
and I am excited about that because I think it's really going to be helping Ali Settinor,
who even when the team is struggling, has been playing pretty well
and has been primarily where the team's goals have been coming from.
the team has also been forced to let to let Allie play in the midfield a little bit due to some injuries
and that's been really interesting for me because that's where Ali has played a lot at North Carolina
anyway I keep track of Sittinora because I enjoy the goals that she does score
team.
I just think, I just think Allie is a good player.
So, you know, it's a give and take.
Yes.
Do you watch a poor theme for a good player?
And how much, how much given take there.
But they got some reinforcement.
So we'll see, we'll see what the next few weeks look like and see if the extra
support helps.
Yeah.
They are mighty ass.
I ain't a lot to you.
I did get to watch, have my boots on the ground to watch Utah in person when they came last week on 420.
And first of all, let me just talk about this real quick.
A beautiful occasion in the city of Louisville, you know what I'm saying?
Thunderover Louisville, Tara, I'm not sure if you're familiar.
It is a...
No.
Okay, so you're familiar with the Kentucky Derby?
All right.
So the two weeks before the Kentucky Derby, we do this thing called the Kentucky Derby Festival.
All right.
There's a lot of things going on, a lot of events, parades, blah, blah, balloon glow, balloon races.
We do a steamboat race, all different types of stuff, just to commemorate Derby.
Sounds lovely.
The kickoff for that is an event called Thunderover Louisville.
It's a huge fireworks show that we do over the river, off of the bridges.
And, I mean, it lasts for like 30 minutes.
I mean, fireworks are just flying everywhere.
Does it scare your children?
No, not necessarily.
No, no.
We had a good time.
Sounds intimidating.
And this thing is like a, it's an event in Louisville.
Like they said 60,000 people were down on the waterfront for Thunder.
Jeez.
And so with Lynn Family Stadium, basically being on the waterfront, it's like a block, a block back.
it's a great place to come and be able to watch the fireworks
without necessarily being in all the hubbub,
which is, like I said, a block away on the actual waterfront.
So this is the first time that match on 420
was the first time that racing had a match on Thunder of Louisville Day.
They've opened the stadium before because, you know,
if you're down on the waterfront, you go down there, right,
and you're just out all day.
you're subject to, you know, Port-a-Potties, a lot of people, et cetera, et cetera.
So they opened the stadium to where, like, you know, you could have a little home base for Thunder Thunder.
But this is the first time they've had a game that a match on Thunder River Louisville.
And we had a record crowd.
Had a record crowd when Utah came to town.
Think about 11,000 people, 115.
It was beautiful to see.
It was a beautiful occasion.
Racing won, 5-1.
and I bring all that up just to say I got to watch Allie Settinor in that match.
Did she get a goal second?
Yes.
She got an assist.
That was the game Sav got her brace.
Right.
Mm-hmm.
Exactly.
And yeah, she was pretty good.
She's just a small person.
You know, she's like a small.
She's a small, stout, little fire hydrant,
but she just has leverage, man,
and she just gets going, carrying the ball up the pitch.
Yeah, I was, I was impressed.
I was impressed for Alba.
Utah is mighty listless.
But, yeah, Alie was doing that thing.
Well, it's going to take, it's going to take a little time.
But I think she's, I think she's a very talented player.
Okay, a big one, Wave versus Bay, FC.
Okay, we just got Naomi Germa back from injury and we lose Abby Dahlkemper to injury.
She was out this week with a thigh injury, the report said.
It was recent too, so it didn't make the original injury report, but they had to repost it to add Abby to it.
Alex Morgan was also out this week with an ankle injury.
But getting the bad news out of the way, we got Jada Chaw's first goal of the season, and it was the game winner.
So she subbed in in the 64th minute, and it was 1-1, and she scored in the 78th minute.
It came from a few passes between herself and McCaskill and Bennett, and I thought it was a lovely finish.
I've been skeptical of how they've been using Jaden Shaw at San Diego.
But like we've said, it's a combination of gold cup fatigue, national team load,
her first bit of managing both worlds a bit and the start of the season.
And it's still early into the NWSL season.
So I'm not that concerned.
I'm more just annoyed at San Diego.
And I had already started building contingency plans just for the fact that if
Jaden Shaw was asked as NWSL season, I had batten down the hatches.
Got my defenses ready.
I had built a moat.
You know what I'm saying?
Put some alligators in it.
Just, you know, for the barbs that might have came my way.
Maybe from you, Tara, maybe from bills.
Maybe from other.
I'm a Jaden fan.
And I am just mad at San Diego.
Yeah, I know.
I know.
I need that to be clear.
I know.
But me as a proponent for NWSL play, as it pertains to call-ups for the national team or whatever, I had started to worry.
I was like, what if Jaden is in fact as this NWSL season, even while, you know, getting assists against whoever we play in the Olympics?
Germany?
Yeah, yeah.
Germany is one of them.
against Germany or whatever in the Olympics.
I was ready to start defending.
I had my swords out.
But it seems like I'm not going to have to do that.
I mean, she's just too good.
Just too good.
I mean, that was the goal of the weekend, I would say.
Just the buildup, the fact that Jaden came all the way back to get that thing,
it was like, you know what?
Like, are y'all trying to win this game?
Let me just go ahead and win.
Let me just go ahead and win this thing for y'all.
Straight through the teeth of the defense.
I mean,
and then finish it off with the run,
with the run to get to the,
to get to the cross that came across the ground
and just tuck that thing away.
I mean, that's, that's prime Jaden Shaw right there.
That's prime Jaden Shaw,
which it reminds me of, like, I think a few tweets.
I think it was Claire,
Claire Watkins one time,
I think it was the Japan goal,
where she said,
Jaden just plays like, hey, guys,
why don't we just kick it in the goal?
And she just does it.
Number one, yes, that's Jaden.
And then also I think Kim McCauley had said that, you know, she is trying not to be too hyperbolic about Jaden Shaw, but she just wants people to realize what we're seeing.
And that's the reason why I'm just so adamant about Jaden Shaw.
I mean, we are talking about, I mean, this is a best player in the world caliber player, possibly.
possibly a goat caliber player.
Like, I don't know.
But when you see what she does and how she does it
and how easy she makes it look at the ripe old age of 19 or whatever,
and she's not turning 20 until like the end of the season.
Oh, that's another thing with Gattino, by the way.
She is, I think, 21.
And she has a very late birthday, too, in December.
So she's just a very young player.
But anyway, yeah, just the fact that she can do it all and just make it look so easy,
I'm going to continue to just pour my emotions out onto this podcast about Jane Shaw and who she is and how good she is.
Because, I mean, truly, we all need to realize it.
Evangelize to your friends, to your folks.
Tell them, tell them the good news.
Tell them the truth that, you know,
Jayden Messiah is here and it's beautiful.
I mean, I call it a Jaden Messiah.
That's right, though.
Jaden the Messiah is here.
Well, I know Casey Stoney has bought a ton of players
and they have a very large bench,
but I would say Jaden Shaw and I believe her name is Elise Bennett.
Yes.
But Elise Bennett had
They had very nice chemistry out there
The Bennett assist
I thought was really nice
I mean that game wasn't very good from
San Diego Wave
But
But they got
They got the winning goal
So I would hope that Casey Stoney
Stoney stuck with that
little group there
because they figured it out at the end
and kind of cut it out with all of the weird lineups
because it's annoying me.
But other than that, Bay FC, the million dollar team,
at least we have Savvy King.
My girl, my young Savvy King.
Savvy, I'd probably say
that she's already like elite at playing defense.
At left back, I mean, just like, she's just in control all the time.
Like she wins every foot race, you know what I'm saying?
And then if you do get to the ball, you're basically just delaying the amount of time until you get tackled.
You know what I'm saying?
I mean, you get that thing, you might touch it two, three times.
Boom, she's coming in, tackle.
She wins them every time.
What I really enjoy watching is when teams play Kansas City and to see what the coach's plans are for Chooinga and Via.
And Montoya's plans for Chooinga was Savvy King.
And that's all of the compliments that you need in a player.
Like Angel City, they move Sarah Gordon wherever Chooinga was.
And when Bay FC played them, they moved savvy wherever she was.
and that just means everything in this league.
That just means that that's your best defender.
Yeah.
And like I said before, just the fact that, you know, I was a little savvy,
hesitant.
I was a little hesitant on savvy.
You know, what I had seen from the youth national teams didn't really give me too excited.
But yeah, I just didn't know that she is just an elite, elite, elite athlete.
Like I said, wins every race.
I mean, it's just not even...
I've yet to see somebody beat her.
And, and, Berndt.
Like, she is extremely fast.
You know, the ball playing will come around.
She has a little bit of a...
She can do it.
It's just to figure out how to do it.
A lot of passes her backwards.
You know what I'm saying?
But she did play a nice little...
Nice little one-two late in the match
and then tried to play a long ball
to release a Bay FC striker.
But, yeah, savvy.
I was just going to say I'm curious what it's going to look like when Bayfc plays Portland and plays Sophia.
But that happens tonight.
That's the first round of Wednesday games are tonight.
So Bayfc versus Portland.
I forgot there were games tonight, which it works out for me because racing plays Orlando on Sunday.
and Orlando got a midweek.
Let's go, baby.
Good.
Okay, we're nearing, wrapping up.
So, Gotham v. Racing,
Tiana Davidson out with a lower leg injury this week,
but the Gotham coach has said that it shouldn't be a long time.
That's a direct quote.
Shouldn't be a long time.
In both goals came in extra time.
So I think that that's kind of a,
entertaining, kind of annoying, depending on how you look at it.
And Rose Lavelle is back at my most conservative estimate.
Okay, so if I was being my toughest on Rose, I was going to say,
in order to get a run at the Olympics, she would have to start playing by May.
And apparently she's doing that.
So how are you feeling?
Feeling about what?
Rose is back, racing can't win, all of the above.
I was wondering, I was like, how do I feel about my team, seeming unability to win a match unless it is against the Utah Royals in front of a record crowd?
Utah.
It is frustrating.
I'll tell you what.
She, like, okay, first of all, we alluded to.
this earlier. Emily Sonnet, you know what I'm saying? RIP, RIP, got absolutely turned inside
out by Emma Sears, who Emma Sears, hey, that's a, that's a player. That's a player right there.
She is very fast, very physical, every time she comes out. I thought she did amazing. I thought
she did amazing. And really, the whole season has been like our kind of.
for like, you know, when she comes on late, like, something's about to happen because
she just gets to running and nobody can stay with her.
She seems to be one of the faster players in this league.
It's crazy.
We sold Timby and basically got another Timby.
Like, like, that's what Emma reminds me of, like, the terror that Timby would cause
opponents just by running and running and, like, you know, just running at people.
That's the same thing Emma does.
So Emma just goes on a incredible carry from like our defensive third
Roast probably like three people in the process.
I mean, just bodies left in her wake.
And after running 80 yards, it's Emily sign it versus Emma Sears,
1v1, mono e mono.
And Emma said, Emily, may I have this dance?
You know what I'm saying?
Cut cut inside, chopped it back to the outside.
I mean, and Emily, you know, like I said, spins around like a top.
Emily gets to the end line, puts a cup back in, ends up being a rail and turn or goal.
And me, watching this in my basement, I stand up, I pump my fist, I say, let's go about five times.
Because I don't know why.
We've had good times against Gotham, for the most part.
we haven't lost at Red Bull Arena ever in the history of racing.
That's a fun fact.
Yeah.
And I was just feeling real good.
We needed a win.
We need all the wins we can get.
We still have yet to lose.
But basically what I'm here to tell you, Tara, is I hadn't sat back in my seat before Roosevelt scored.
I'm like, bro, come on.
It's incredible.
Because with this being in my head, the fact that we continue to give up leads and time matches,
I mean, we've given up six points so far this season from winning position.
Like I said, still have yet to lose.
And did this like four times last year, too.
I'm like, okay.
I'm like, okay, we don't score it in the 94th.
I mean, there is like 10 minutes of stoppage time, so there's six minutes
remaining, but come all, racing.
We got to get this one.
I mean, a minute and a half later, bro.
Katie Lund, you know, I'm taking all Katie Lund shouts out.
She's been a little suspect this season.
Punished.
She's been a little suspect.
Did not call off Aaron Wright.
You can tell, I mean, it's not very loud in Red Bull Arena when Gotham plays.
It's not very loud when the New York Red Bulls.
play.
You know what I'm saying?
And so that
leads me to believe that you clearly did not
tell
Aaron Wright,
yo, I got this.
Aaron Wright,
chasing the ball,
you know, just looking at the ball,
unaware that, you know,
the keeper is about to just smash into her.
Collision happens.
Ball is dropped.
Roosevelt scores.
Crazy.
Incredible.
But she's,
back. She's back. She's back.
I can't let a score like it.
But yeah, she
did seem, you know, lively,
sprightly.
She was running. Yeah, she was running.
A lot of it wasn't really too
dangerous. Like, I don't know. Rose has to,
Rose has, you know, you need to start
going to goal, Rose. You know?
It's like, nobody can touch you for the most part
when you're dribbling, do your thing. Like, take that
and take that aggression and go towards goal.
A lot of what she was doing
in this match was sideways.
But, you know, she's just back.
She's just back.
I think it was like a two, three week injury.
So, Rose, you got a lot to prove to me
and Tara and Bells.
I don't know if you got a lot to prove to Emma.
Emma seems to be in the Rose camp.
But, come on, Rose, man.
It's time.
It's time.
us see something. Let us see something.
Okay. I have
a few more things, so then we can close up.
It's some repetition here, but stay with me.
I have some general centerback fear.
I want to get off my chest.
See if you agree or not, or maybe you can ease it,
or maybe you can even just say, it's not valid.
You know, open table. You can say whatever you want.
Tierra is out.
Like I said, apparently it's not for long, but she is out.
Abby Dalkempur is out.
Maybe not for long, but she has dealt with a lot of injuries before.
Naomi Germa is our prize player, and I have made it clear to the disdain of many in the Discord.
But I've started to have a bit of tunnel vision about our Olympic roster alternates.
How do we make sure we have good centerback options if something happens?
So in my mind, there's Emily Sonnet knocking on the door to be a centerback option, centerback emergency option.
There's Casey Kruger, but, you know, she's missed out on these rosters many times.
there's Eva who has not who's one professional season in and very, very tall and just missed a lot of aerial duels.
So, and then what, there's Becky? I'm nervous about all of them.
Yo, so this is.
What, what do we do?
Next, next, uh, next, we're going to have to do like a little, a little center back round up just as far as like the one.
outside the pool.
You know?
This is why I asked you about Malia Berkeley
just to see if you had any
if you had any thoughts
just from watching matches.
But yeah, we're going to do a round-up.
You know, Malia, what, Stobb?
Sam's.
Gordon?
Yeah, Sam's, Gordon.
Tatum Malazzo.
We're going to have to see if we got
something in there somewhere.
We're dangerous and close
to like,
danger to sound.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So I will say, Tara,
uh,
none of these injuries seem,
seem serious.
Like,
I mean,
okay.
It's possible that like,
you know,
Naomi had her time out with their thigh.
And they were like,
Abby,
you know,
you go ahead and have your time.
Because, you know,
Abby hasn't been playing a lot of football,
had her,
had her gold cup running.
And maybe it's a possibility that,
She could be redlining right now, too, just from overloading because the fact that she just hasn't played a lot of ball.
So until I...
She was out what?
Abby was out almost two seasons with back injuries?
I mean, gone.
Season and a half?
Yeah.
So we'll see.
We'll see.
But I do think that we'll probably be all right.
just talking about the players that are out right now,
I think they're not going to be out long.
It doesn't seem.
It doesn't seem like there's going to be too much of an issue.
But, yeah, centerback is a position of need as it stands currently.
And yeah, Emily Sana is not convincing me that she can play there.
And a lot of tough damn sharing.
If I see, if I see an Olympic roster and
the alternate is a Becky Sowerbren.
I'm going to cry.
That's scary.
It is scary at this point.
It is scary.
So, uh, okay.
Yeah, we'll just have to see.
We'll just have to see.
Oh, I'll respect to Becky.
God love you, but that would scare me.
Much respect to the legend.
Okay.
Closing up, we have a Chelsea game today at 2 p.m.
Hopefully we get a good amount of cat minutes.
Um, if this.
is out by then, I hope, you know, come watch it with me. I'd love, you know, come talk at.
M.O. will be stateside before we know it. We have three NWSL games tonight, Orlando versus North
Carolina, Chicago versus Washington Spirit, and Bay FC versus Portland Thorns. And we have games
June 1st and June 4th, national team games, June 1st and June 4th. So, Theorette,
theoretically, we could have a roster in three weeks or so.
So that's just one and a half.
Well, so Wednesdays by then.
Yep.
I forgot about those games until I looked up the,
until I was looking up the,
the D.C. one.
But yeah, St. Paul and Denver,
the USW&T is coming to you.
Maybe we'll see.
Emma time.
Emma time.
You know, she's going to be coming to the USWNT.
trophyless and hungry, it seems.
And I think she's just going to be furious, don't you?
Yep.
Yep.
Velasquez is going to be there.
At St. Paul?
At one of them, I know.
A few people in the Discord are going to go to the Colorado one.
I know.
I've seen that.
Boots on the ground is always a good thing.
Yes, for sure.
For sure.
But thank you for talking to me today, Vince.
I help
Adam if you're there listening
I hope you're having a lovely time in Italy
Yes
The blue collar episode of Wosa Wednesday
Has been a great time though
That's right
That man's out there
You know
Galavan around
Drinking some
I don't know
What they got in Italy
Drinking some of the finest olive oil
By the gallon
That has ever been
I hope he's just eating
Jolato
And wearing cashmere
and just doing whatever he wants.
Canoli?
Is that an Italian-American invention or is that real deal, Italian?
Anyway.
I think it's real deal.
Okay.
Fair enough.
Well, yeah, from Tara, from Vince.
We'll see you.
