For the better of the team, yes. This is where it gets tricky. Obviously there isn't the same kind of money in women's soccer as there is in men's soccer. Call-ups have become a big part of potential earnings of some players.
New contracts, new parameters are needed top to bottoms. More total money, allocated differently, still allowing the core to make a v good living but allowing more folks to move in and out of the system while also getting paid well. Reality is, it wouldn't cost a lot more money and who here is worried about the Federation's bank account. (cha ching). But we can no longer not invite players who are in great form to training camps and Nat games because of seniority on the team and "no spots available". It's an outdated formula that's a disservice to having the best national team.
There's a Catch-22. Unfortunately, the money hasn't proven to be there if players aren't recognizable.
I think the US team, win or lose, should undergo major changes after the World Cup. At least half a dozen players should retire or be retired after a "victory tour." This would include the older players -- Wambach, Rampone, and Boxx -- plus several who saw little action during the World Cup. Then a dozen or more new players should be invited to the next training camp of the US national team with a good chance of making the squad for fall and spring friendlies. Dunn and Horan should certainly be on that list of call-ups along with the best performers in the NWSL and possibly a player or two from the U-20s. The objective should be to have a remodeled team for the Olympics in 2016. A prime objective would be to find a defensive center midfielder and a right midfielder. Winters, Huster, Nairn all strike me as good candidates for the former and Ohai may fit the bill for the latter. What an increased number of callups would do is spread some of the wealth of the US National Team around to the impoverished players of the NWSL. For the future, that seems like a good idea to me.
How and when has the money proven to not be there? The federation has a lot of money. As Rapinoe and even April recently said, we need YOUNGER players in camps. More than 1 player who's 20 or under. let's keep in mind that all the best European teenagers and 20 year olds are professionals, playing on a team 9-10 months out of the year, at a high quality. We can not continue to keep our best youth solely on college teams, they need to play up.
Absolutely spot on, the WNT is the only team on the planet that players are moved off the team when "they decide" to retire!. There are already older NT players declaring they are planning on playing after this WC, doesn't look like they are afraid of getting cut or a new guard coming in.. Its too bad the USA doesn't have two national teams to give themselves actual competition between players. At the last U23- full WNT camp I was amazed they not only didn't practice on the same field , they didn't dare actually scrimmage each other.
This is something I've suggested before. And they had a perfect opportunity to use one this year, at the Pan Am games.
http://ftw.usatoday.com/2015/06/the...mens-soccer-are-waiting-for-a-chance-to-coach Michelle Akers, arguably the best women’s soccer player ever who was part of two World Cups in 1991 and ‘99, would love to coach in the women’s national team program. She’s been in contact with Heinrichs and did one youth camp in San Diego, but says she hasn’t been connected since. “I’m not sure they want us to be involved,” Akers said. “Why push and push? They know we’re here. They know what we have to offer.”
Let's not forget that Akers, along with Tiffeny Milbrett, were highly critical of Heinrichs' regime. http://www.socceramerica.com/article/6522/tiffeny-milbrett-reacts-to-heinrichs-resignation.html
(scratches head) 1. The USA today article does not mention Milbrett. 2. The article you posted (which i like) doesn't mention Akers. - so what's the connection here? 3. Most of the entire US soccer world was excited by April's resignation. Is April blocking prior stars from joining her in US development and coaching? “Hopefully one day I’ll be the coach of a youth national team and maybe the women’s national team,” Chastain told USA TODAY Sports. What’s preventing Chastain — a player who put women’s soccer on the map for young girls everywhere in 1999 — from being the U.S. Soccer coaching system if she wants to be? “If you know the answer to that, I’d love to know what it is,” she said. “I don’t know.” “I’ve been asking that question for a long time and I think the German Federation, they do it the right way,” Wambach said. “They put the women in their full national team, they give them positions, whether it be full administrative side or the coaching side. You see it in their youth teams— they are former players. And right now, we have a few former players, but not as many as some other federations, so I think we have things to learn from different federations and maybe that’s a conversation we have in the near future.” Even if it isn’t a coaching role, Foudy wishes there was a greater connectivity between generations of players, and an open line of communication linking current and future players with those who came before.
I admit I gave the FTW article a chance, but there's nothing new in there. FTW is just a Buzzfeed style clickbait site.
Tiffeny has been coaching at the youth level for a few years now. From 2009-2015, she coached a girls team at MVLA (NorCal) taking that team from U8 up to ECNL. In March, she moved to coach the U13/14G age group at the Colorado Storm. I don't know her ultimate coaching aspirations, but she's learning the craft.
The contract thing is overblown. If the USSF suits truly fully supported the USWNT like they want everyone to think they do and a USWNT head coach called up non-contract players and/or asked a few contract player to spend a camp focusing on their club team, it wouldn't be a problem. Even now (well, not in the middle of a WWC) a USWNT coach could push to bring in whomever whenever but don't. The contracts are a convenient scapegoat. As for former players who want to be involved in coaching & in the USWNT or Uxx set-up and yet being pushed out? Is anyone even a little surprised about that given April is in charge & the history of the USSF suits & them doing what they've always done w/ this particular generation? And that doesn't even include talk about the problem of sexism in the coaching profession (in all sports, not just soccer).
Well, a direct quote from the article is: English might be my second language, but I'm pretty sure Akers was mentioned there. It might go a little ways towards explaining why Akers hasn't heard from Ape.
Akers and April won a WC together and played on the national team for years and year - they have long relationship. The original article has nothing to do with Milbrett - it doesn't mention her or her desire to coach in the national team system. Lilly, Foudy, Akers, Chastain, Heath are quoted. The two articles aren't related, but i'm troubled. Are you making the point that April has the right to turn down coaching candidates in 2015 because of comments that may have been made about her as a coach over a decade ago? April should be hiring the best coaches to further develop young women. Clearly, Lilly, Foudy, Akers, Chastain all feel like April is blocking them from being involved in the youth and women's team. Why though? Is she protection her job? Personal vendetta?
I do wonder what April would point as proof of her success. Seems the program has been in neutral for a decade. I can imagine April doesn't want anybody in the program who is outspoken or might rock the boat. It's all buddy buddy in the program. Have there been ANY new people to emerge on the girls side that didn't have a reporting relationship at some point to April and Jill?
Were you following the team when April became head coach of the USWNT? Based on the post I quotes, either you weren't or were young enough to not read/see the backroom stuff that went on. The most tactful way I can say it is that when April became the USWNT coach she worked to distance herself from the players with whom she'd played and not in a good way. April was hired by the suits over Gregg for a reason. And that reason was not that April had been the USWNT captain & Gregg had not. So, having played with April was actually a bigger con than it would be a pro in terms of relationship building & developing careers as coaches in the system. Not every former player wants to be a coach. But for a generation that was this talented on the field to have so very few now involved in coaching? eyebrow raising.
Pretty sure the US isn't sending either a men's 0r women's team. This article from Jan. also says no US teams: http://www.thespec.com/pan-am-games...ms-for-pan-am-soccer-tournament-taking-shape/ eta: and this one from the same Canadian paper from March: http://www.pressreader.com/canada/the-hamilton-spectator/20150317/282256663977251/TextView
Strange decision and the only think I can think of is that even if we were to send an U-23, majority of those players are playing in the NWSL and they maybe didn't want to cause anymore disruptions to the season. Though that doesn't explain why they aren't sending a men's team
Google helps refresh my memory that the last US team to go to the Pan Am games was when we used it as a warm up/testing ground in 2007 for the 2008 U20 WWC. And Jill Ellis was still the coach of that team. They were beaten soundly by Brazil in the final (a Brazilian team w/ the names everyone knows). And then in January of 2008 Ellis stepped aside from the U20 team and DiCicco was brought in. And revamped the team a little bit (not much but in a couple of crucial places) and then the team won the U20 WWC in 2008. eta: A little something else happened in 2007 that distracted quite a bit from the Pan Am games result for US fans.
And thanks to this thread & your question about the Pan Am Games, I just took a long jaunt down memory lane w/ what all went on w/ the build up to the 2008 U20 WWC, the team w/ Ellis, Ellis being quoted during the 2007 Pan Am Games as saying she didn't think that the squad had the talent of the previous U20 team *, Ellis "stepping aside," DiCicco getting hired, DiCicco making a couple of changes & then winning the whole thing. And, wow, I'm old. *(I didn't remember her saying that--and it is super interesting when you look at the batch just b/f & this one & who was on or eligible for both the 2006 & 2008 U20 cup, who DiCicco cut, who is still around, etc)