KASHIMA, Japan – Carli Lloyd has no time left and all the time she needed, a poor combination. As his US teammates congratulated Canada on winning the Olympic semifinal, Lloyd squatted, head down. The 1-0 defeat of the US women’s national team didn’t necessarily sting her any more than anyone else did. He had no more to lose than the other players. But he had more football behind him.
The United States has lost hope of an Olympic gold medal. Lloyd has lost what may be his last chance to win a major tournament. US fans may begin to lose a group of women who built on the work of previous generations and cultivated a legacy of their own.
We will still see some of Lloyd, Megan Rapinoe, Tobin Heath, Alex Morgan and Christen Press. But not necessarily all together. There are a lot of positives to this game, but in the US it will be the lasting one.
“Obviously there are some of us who are closer to the end than the start, certainly,” Rapinoe said. “And we had an incredible run. We’ve had a lot of nights that seem different than that. … We’ve been through so much together, so yeah, it’s a little sad. But it seems to me that it is in good hands. “
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Canada’s only goal came from a Jessie Fleming penalty, a goal in the 75th minute made possible by a VAR review on an involuntary foul by Tierna Davidson. On top of that, the United States overtook Canada, 13-3. The Canadians did what less talented and accomplished teams do: they played a disciplined and physical game and hoped they could make a play or two that would make a difference. It worked, for the nation’s first victory over the United States in 20 years. If it works again, Canada will win gold in women’s football for the first time.
Still: The United States looked, once again, more of an excellent team in transition than the best team in the world. Look at the roster, half of which includes players aged 30 and over, and ask yourself: How many players on this team are close to their best right now? Most are falling or rising. Rapinoe said goalkeeper Alyssa Naeher is probably the only American who can feel great about how she played in this tournament. Naeher left this game with a knee injury after 30 minutes and Adrianna Franch was in goal for Fleming’s decider.
The USWNT has been so good for so long it was easy to see the names on the jerseys and expect excellence. It never came. The Olympics are held in a compressed time frame, but the sample size was large enough. Americans have never played a great game. They had traits in the quarter-finals against Holland that hinted that a great match was possible. But then they showed up in Kashima and seemed to have done so for the vast majority of the tournament. Passes were a bit scarce. The energy has arrived and signaled.
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“I don’t think with the caliber players, we’ve shown anything (like) what we’re capable of,” Lloyd said. “You know, you’ve seen glimpses.”
These women have a lot of pride. That’s why this hurt so much. But that’s also what made the ride so admirable. They squeezed until there was nothing left in the tube. When Lloyd finally left the camp, she said in a low voice that she hoped the media wouldn’t talk to her, and then she stood in front of a table instead of behind it, as requested. It was as if he had no extra steps in his legs.
“Simply gutted,” Lloyd said. “You know, we wake up early, we train late, we sacrifice ourselves, we give up a lot. You want to win “.
Lloyd, the oldest USWNT Olympian ever, will turn 40 next summer. It is no longer in question for the best player in the world. But he still had no interest in settling down.
Rapinoe was an exuberant and inspiring figure, and at times this masks her witty spirit. When asked what this means for US fans, he replied, “well, if they’re popping up now, I mean, it’s quite a bandwagon.” He joked about reporters “trying to push me to the pasture” without a hint of anger. But he’s 36. She came off the bench this week. She is a realist.
Asked about his future, Rapinoe said, “I didn’t think too much about sharing it with you guys.” Those two words, you guys, indicate that perhaps he has made a decision. He also said: “We don’t really allow ourselves the luxury of going one year at a time.” The next big tournament, the 2023 Women’s World Cup, is expected to start between July 2 in Australia and New Zealand.
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If this was the end for a few seniors, American veterans handled it with the same skill anyone could hope for. Both Rapinoe and Lloyd have pointed out that they have a match for the bronze medal on the way. There were no complaints about the penalty. Rapinoe also threw a symbolic arm around coach Vlatko Andonovski’s shoulder.
Fans love to question the manager’s decisions. It’s nice to imagine that a different lineup or combination would have been better. But Rapinoe said that for all that analysis of those decisions, the difference was “everything else”. She wasn’t quite sure how to define it, but she decided to “make it”. It might sound commonplace, but it didn’t sound like that. Rapinoe seemed to be saying, as tactfully as possible, that whoever blames the coaching staff missed the point.
“You know, this group below us and even younger than that is just a great group and great footballers,” Rapinoe said, “so I feel like we’ve done our job. But you never want it to end.”
All ends. It ends earlier for athletes than for most people. But even on a disappointing night in a frustrating tournament, you could pay two compliments to this group of players: they have been fantastic and their team will be fantastic when they are gone.
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