History Repeats Itself with USWNT
Andonovski will hope his team is setting up for a 2023 World Cup run
Wind back the clock to 2016. The US Women’s National Team had just won their third Women’s World Cup the year prior in 2015 hosted by our neighbors up north. Expecting to dominate the upcoming Rio Olympics as reigning World Champions, the team exited in the Quarterfinal. They lost to a Sweden team that presented a blueprint for every other team in the world on how to beat the US.
Play physically and remove space for the USWNT to run in behind. The coach of the national team at the time - Jill Ellis knew she had to change something. At the point when you’re a world champion, your biggest competition is yourself.
Jill Ellis had three years until the next World Cup to make major changes to the style and talent pool of her squad. Ellis focused the next two years on expanding the player pool, placing a line breaking player in the midfield, and having her team play different exhibition matches against the best teams in the world.
And nobody can say this plan didn’t work. In the 2017 She Believes Cup the US lost two of their three matches to England and France respectively. In 2018 at the same tournament against the same teams the US won 2 and drew 1. The plan had been set in motion and the team was starting to gel.
History shows us what happened in the 2019 World Cup. A dominant US team that won for the fourth time, and even got chastised for defeating a group stage opponent Thailand 13-0.
Then Jill Ellis stepped away and in came current manager Vlatko Andonovski.
In the 2020(1) edition of the Olympic games, the USWNT again were defeated before the final match, falling to Canada in the semi-final. Vlatko needed to make some changes, find youth and add depth in creative roles. Sound familiar?
Then the USWNT played their most difficult stretch of matches ever in 2022 losing four matches in a row, twice to Germany, once to Spain, and once to reigning Euro winners England.
Now the 2023 World Cup looms, with the USWNT having gone through a rapid change of personnel and style, all in preparation to win the World Cup. It hasn’t been pretty, and it wasn’t in the lead up to 2019 either. Andonovski will hope history continues to repeat itself for his team as he prepares them for this summer.
Good analysis, Jake. Unfortunately, the women's team is now facing the same problem previous editions of the men's team faced. We have the athletes; our opponents have the technical players and enough athleticism. I cringe when I watch our women in tight spaces.