CHULA VISTA Calif., Aug. 10, 2003 -- If any youth or high school girls
soccer players in San Diego need any further inspiration to drive their goals,
they will need only to make the trek eastward along Olympic Parkway in Chula
Vista later this month to discover their “field of dreams.”
The world’s top women’s soccer players are
coming to the ARCO U.S. Olympic Training Center Aug. 20-24 as part of a training
camp called by U.S. women’s national team coach April Heinrichs in
preparation for the 2003 Women’s World Cup that will be played later
this fall in this country.
Among the players expected at the camp — held in
conjunction with the WUSA’s Founders Cup III championship game Aug.
24 at the University of San Diego’s Torero Stadium — are Mia Hamm,
Brandi Chastain, Kristine Lilly, Julie Foudy and Joy Fawcett.
Foudy and Fawcett both play professionally for the hometown
WUSA San Diego Spirit, which is hoping to nail down a Founders Cup finals
berth after qualifying for the league’s four-team playoff field for
the first time in its thee-year history.
Hamm and Lilly lead the domestic parade of national team
players on the three other WUSA semifinalists. Hamm’s popularity
doesn’t seem to have abated despite nearing the final stages of her
playing career after drawing Spirit franchise record crowds of 6,733 and
6,858, respectively, to the Washington Freedom’s two games this season
at Torero Stadium.
Last chance to see the
superstars?
The WUSA’s core audience is pre-teen and teen-age
girls. They want to believe their heroines will last forever.
That may be the biggest motivational factor to catch
a glimpse in the flesh of players like Hamm, Lilly, Fawcett, Foudy and Chastain
next week while they are a handshake away. It is expected that a sizable
segment of the U.S. women’s national team will elect for retirement
after the 2003 Women’s World Cup and 2004 Olympic Games. This will be
a chance to bid a fond farewell to America’s “greatest
generation” of female soccer players.
In fact, the expected stampede to retirement has already
started.
Midfielder Tisha Venturini-Hoch, the first player to
win championships in the WUSA, World Cup, Olympics and NCAA and a WUSA founding
player, saw her No.15 CyberRays jersey retired following Sunday’s 1-0
loss to the regular season champion Boston Breakers in San Jose.
The 16-nation Women’s World Cup runs Sept. 20 to
Oct. 12. The United States , with titles in 1991 and 1999 sandwiched around
a gold medal at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics, is looking to become the first
nation to win back-to-back Women’s World Cup titles, though the Americans
are no longer considered to be the overwhelming favorites they once were.
Still, when FIFA — the international governing body of soccer —
released its first-ever women’s world rankings in advance of July’s
Women’s World Cup draw, the USA was ranked No.1. However, the rest of
the world is not far behind as the sport starts to gain momentum worldwide
with an estimated 22 million female soccer players.
Norway — the reigning Olympic champion and 1995
Women’s World Cup champion — is ranked second, a scant 10 votes
behind Team USA, while third-ranked Germany (1995 runners-up and current
European champions) stands just 17 points behind the Americans. China (1999
runners-up) is ranked fourth and Sweden is ranked fifth.
Both the Norwegians, who relegated Team USA to the silver
medal at the 2000 Sydney Olympics, and Germany are considered strong favorites
to end the Americans’ World Cup reign.
Rounding out the top 10 ranked teams are South American
champion Brazil (sixth), Asian champion North Korea (seventh), Denmark (eighth),
France (ninth) and Italy (10th). Both Denmark and Italy, however, are not
among the 16 qualified nations for the 2003 Women’s World Cup.
The 2003 Women’s World Cup field also includes Russia
(ranked 11th), Canada (12th), Japan (14th), Australia (15th), Nigeria (23rd),
South Korea (24th), Argentina (35th) and Ghana (53rd).
The United States, which has compiled a 222-47-30 record
since its inception in 1985, will compete in Group A along with Sweden, North
Korea and Nigeria. With three top 10-ranked teams, the group has already
been dubbed the “Group of Death.”
China, which will host the 2007 Women’s World Cup
after this spring’s SARS epidemic forced the tournament’s move
to the western hemisphere, got the weakest draw in opponents in Group D (Russia,
Australia and Ghana) as perhaps a consolation.
The next FIFA world rankings are due out Aug. 29.
April Heinrichs to name
roster
Team USA head coach April Heinrichs, who has been noticeably
visible at several Spirit games this season scouting talent in WUSA matches,
has held off naming the final America roster pending the miraculous recovery
of Spirit forward Shannon MacMillan, who suffered a torn anterior cruciate
ligament in the WUSA team’s sixth game of the season back in May. It
will be Heinrich’s job to assemble a team that blends its marquee name
talent with younger players who have the ability and desire to keep the rest
of the world at bay.
“I think we have a nice mix of young professionals.
I don’t want to go into the World Cup without veteran leadership.
We’re going to be under the microscope of the entire world,” Heinrichs
said. “On the other hand, I don’t want to have a team loaded with
older players. They have to play six games in a two-week period. “
After concluding the ARCO training camp, Team USA will
play a friendly matches against Costa Rica Sept. 1 in Carson and against
Mexico Sept. 7 in San Jose as a final send-off to the Women’s World
Cup.
The founding of the WUSA was to serve as a developmental
league for future talent for the U.S. women’s national team as well
as providing a proving ground for national team players from around the world
to hone their skills at a premier level. With seven of the league’s
eight teams in playoff contention until the final two games of regular season,
play, the WUSA’s goal of parity appears to have been achieved. No team
has yet to repeat its Founders Cup title.
Founder's Cup previews World
Cup
The league’s international players involved in this
weekend’s four-team WUSA semifinals and next weekend’s Founders
Cup III championship game, together with a corresponding complement of U.S.
national team players, will combine to provide a mini-World Cup preview.
Regardless of which teams advance to the Founders Cup III title game, be
assured the talent on the field will be world-class.
At least six Spirit players are slated to represent their
countries in the Women’s World Cup. Fawcett (16 years in national team
service) and Foudy (15 years) are among Team USA’s ageless warhorses
while 23-year-old midfielder Aly Wagner, the 2002 U.S. collegiate Player
of the Year, is obviously among its young lionesses. Goalkeeper Jaime Pagliarulo
has also received national team attention in recent months and netminding
partner Jenni Branam could deserve a look as well should she lead the Spirit
through to this year’s WUSA championship.
The Spirit’s allotment of four international players
includes three who will be likely candidates for inclusion on their respective
country’s Women’s World Cup team roster: Brazilian midfielder Daniela,
Canadian forward Christine Latham and Chinese forward Zhang Quying.
Zhang played 61 minutes in the now famous 1999 Women’s
World Cup championship game shootout against the United States, converting
on her penalty kick.
Atlanta’s U.S. national team players include goalkeeper
Briana Scurry, midfielder Nikki Serlenga (San Pasqual High) and forward Cindy
Parlow, the youngest player to win an Olympic gold medal (2000) and Women’s
World Cup title (1999). The Beat’s international players include Japanese
midfielder Homare Sawa, German forward Conny Pohlers, Canadian forward Charmaine
Hooper (Canada’s all-time leader in appearances and goals) and Mexican
forward Maribel Dominguez (WUSA All-Star Game skills MVP). Mexico will not
compete in the 16-team Women’s World Cup finals, however.
Washington’s allotment of Team USA players is led
by the ageless Hamm, 31, and includes goalkeeper Siri Mullinix and forward
Abby Wambach (the WUSA’s 2002 Rookie of the Year). The Freedom’s
international discovery players include Australian midfielder Kelly Golebiowski,
German defenders Steffi Jones and Sandra Minnert and forward Jennifer Meier.
Among the league’s decorated international players,
both Jones and Minnert were members of Germany’s 1999 Women’s World
Cup team and 2000 bronze medal-winning Olympic team while Golebiowski became
the youngest player to play for Australia’s national team at 14 years
old in 1996 (she represented Australia in both the 1999 Women’s World
Cup and 2000 Olympics and helped Australia record its highest-ever finish
— second place — at the 2002 U.S. Nike Cup).
Boston’s Team USA allocations include “iron
woman” forward/midfielder Kristine Lilly (the world’s most capped
player) but the Breakers may be best known for their international stars
— Norwegians Dagny Mellgren and Ragnhild Gullbrandsen and German Maren
Meinert.
Meinert recorded a WUSA-record 16 assists in 2002 and
ranks as the Breakers’ all-time points leader (81) while Mellgren
(Boston’s career goalscoring leader with 36) tied with French international
Marinette Pichon of the Philadelphia Charge to lead the WUSA with 14 goals.
As for a who’s who of possible stars at the upcoming
ARCO center training camp?
With more than 229 caps and a world-record 137 goals,
Hamm, 31, stands as the most recognizable women’s soccer player in the
world, and after leading the WUSA in overall scoring with 11 goals and 11
assists this season, has proven she is still at the top of her game. She
earned an unprecedented five U.S. Soccer Chevrolet Female Athlete of the
Year awards from 1994-98 and recorded two assists in 2000 Olympic Games
championship match against Norway. She won a gold medal in the 1996 Olympic
Games and has played in all three previous Women’s World Cups, winning
gold in 1991 and 1999 and bronze in 1995. She began her national team odyssey
in 1987.
Team USA’s starting goalkeeper from 1994-99, Scurry
played every minute of every match in the 1999 Women’s World Cup, allowing
just three goals and recording four shutouts, including the penalty kick
save on China’s third shot to give Team USA the win in front of more
than 93,000 fans in Pasadena’s Rose Bowl. She appears to have returned
to top form as well after leading all WUSA starting goalkeepers with a 0.95
GAA this season.
A member of the first U.S. youth team to compete in China
in 1997, Wambach finished second to teammate Hamm in WUSA scoring this season
with 13 goals and six assists after scoring 10 goals and 10 assists in her
breakout season in 2002.
Mullinix was Team USA’s top goalkeeper in 2000,
leading the Americans to 15 shutouts overall and a silver medal at the 2000
Sydney Olympics. She led the WUSA in save percentage (.808) and ranked second
in goals-against average (1.19) in leading the Freedom to its first-ever
playoff appearance in 2002.
After leading San Jose to the WUSA’s inaugural Founders
Cup title, goalkeeper LaKeysia Beene will be sitting on the sidelines watching
this year’s championship game but may be the strongest candidate to
end up in the Team USA net.
Serlenga, who saw action as a substitute in the 2000
Olympic Games, is an obvious poster girl for current area youth and high
school players to emulate.
Is there pressure for the Americans to win it all on
home soil again, especially in regard to maintaining a high level of exposure
to keep the finanically-plagued WUSA afloat? The Team USA party line seems
to be just the opposite: Strong performances by other nations, backboned
by the league’s showcase international players, should only enhance
the WUSA’s image.
“Every game will be a great game. It will be a great
tournament,” said Latham, who ranked second in scoring on the Spirit
this season with six goals and three assists. “Having a tournament like
the World Cup only enhances the league. There are so many players in the
WUSA who will also be playing in the World Cup, and having so many in the
WUSA, it’s a chance for fans to come out and see them.”
Heroes, it seems, are made every day.
For complete a Women’s World Cup schedule and ticket
information, visit the Web site at www.fifaworldcup.com.
2003 FIFA Women’s World Cup
(Latest FIFA World Rankings)
Group A
United States (#1)
Sweden (#5)
Nigeria (#23)
North Korea (#7)
Group B
Norway (#2)
France (#9)
Brazil (#6)
South Korea (#24)
Group C
Germany (#3)
Canada (#12)
Japan (#14)
Argentina (#35)
Group D
China (#4)
Ghana (#53)
Australia (#15)
Russia (#11)
