When the men's World Cup is happening, I'll tend to spend words on kits I like, teams I like for irrational reasons, players I enjoy watching every four years, since I don't go out of my way to watch, say, Kylian Mbappe during his regular season.
When the women's World Cup is happening, I may not write as much, but only because my country's team is good. Well, at least present in the tournament. Unlike the gentlemen last year.
And, while being present alone may qualify as a victory (um, right fellas?), this assemblage of soccer players is, possibly unarguably, the greatest team that's ever been. Should that be with all caps?
The Greatest Association Football Team Ever.
At least the Greatest National Association Football Team Ever.
I'm not using any gender modifiers, either.
This year, the association football---soccer---played at the tournament was widely seen as the best and highest quality it had ever been for the women's side. France, the hosts, were very strong and the second-favorites. The Swedish ladies kicked our butts in the Olympics. England and the Netherlands have some of the best (non-US) players in the ladies game. Germany and Brazil also sport strong organizations that can be counted on to field formidable teams.
The USNWT never trailed in any game at this tournament. They won every single match, never trailed, never went to extra time, never needed penalty kicks to decide a match. This kind of dominance is totally unprecedented in any World Cup.
The talent is spread across the men's national teams more, which is why (they'll say) you can't find this kind of dominance in any men's WC.
Whatever.
We all should appreciate what we just got to witness.
I love, also, how bonkers much of the country goes, and rightfully so. It's awesome that it's fully okay right now to celebrate a national hero like Megan Rapinoe: outspokenly anti-Orange Roughy, outspokenly gay, the first white athlete to kneel with Kap.
When the crowd is chanting "EQ-UAL-PAY" an they're being awarded the Cup---in France---you know a nerve was hit.
The pay. Holy moly, I was ignorant. I would have guessed, correctly, that they were getting paid less than the men. I would have been way off in how much less.
The men make more in losses than the women will make in four victories. The men will make more money just reaching the knockout stage of the tournament than these women will for winning the entire thing.
For World Cup tournament victories---single games, mind you---it's like, $16k for the guys, and $1300 for the ladies; for losses, $5k for the fellas, el zilcho for the ladies.
The women will have to essentially win the entire tournament just to make UNDER A QUARTER of what the men would make to get to the quarter-finals.
It's horsehit, but this is our world.
Some interesting reading material:
Some interesting reading material:
- Megan Rapinoe's girlfriend, multiple WNBA champion Sue Bird wrote a stream of consciousness piece titled So The President Fucking Hates My Girlfriend
- Megan herself wrote her own piece You Can't Get Rid of Your Girl That Easily
And, just to be fair to these athlete-authors, here's a list of essays and stories from the USWNT players, all courtesy of Derek Jeter's journalism website, The Player's Tribune:
- Crystal Dunn's American Girl
- Carli Lloyd's The Curb
- Alex Morgan's The Note
- Julie Ertz's Up the Mountain
- Mallory Pugh's The Reckless Child
- Lindsey Horan's This is Happening
In my line of work, just listening can be the biggest thing someone can do.
Go ladies!
PAY THESE WOMEN!
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