U.S women crash out of World Cup

At the same stage their male counterparts did last year

Early this morning, the U.S. women’s soccer team was eliminated from the World Cup. The team lost to Sweden on penalty kicks. The defeat came in the Round of 16.

The women’s team was unfortunate to lose to Sweden. It dominated play, but couldn’t put the ball past the Swedish goalkeeper, who made a string of good-to-excellent saves. Then, in the penalty shoot out, three U.S. women failed to put the ball on target. One of them was Megan Rapinoe. More on her later.

The U.S. was also unfortunate in that a number of its star players were unavailable for the tournament due to injury. My impression is that several other top teams had stars missing for the same reason, but it may be that the U.S. team was particularly hard hit.

The U.S. women’s team was eliminated from this World Cup at the same stage that the men’s team was bounced from last year’s World Cup. And the circumstances were similar in that both failed to win their Group and thus were forced to play high-quality teams that won theirs.

I’m not churlish enough to take pleasure when any American team loses at anything, but there is poetic justice in seeing the women’s team fail to surpass what the men’s team accomplished. For during the women’s quest for “equal pay,” we were constantly reminded how much better than the men’s team the women’s team fares in international competition.

The reminder was accurate, but misleading. The women’s team has been a big fish in a small pond. The men’s team swims in an ocean.

U.S. men compete against scores of nations where soccer is king. A large percentage, perhaps a majority, of the boys in these countries dream of playing soccer professionally, and a great many devote a huge amount of effort to achieving this dream.

Youth academies run by professional teams recruit the best boys, often by the age of 10, and school them in the game. The top players who emerge from this system eventually play for the team or are sold for big bucks to top European clubs.

American men end up competing on the international stage with the products of this system which doesn’t yet have a true counterpart in the U.S., where soccer is maybe the fourth most popular men’s sport.

Women’s soccer is just a rumor in many of the countries that funnel boys into the professional ranks. And there are only a handful countries, if that, in which more than a small fraction of girls dream about, much less work towards, becoming professional soccer players.

To be fair, the international women’s game is improving quickly. In this World Cup, nations that would simply have been making up the numbers in the past (every continent is granted a certain number of slots) advanced past the group stage, and we aren’t seeing those awful double digit blowouts any more. The play also passes the eye test — at least in this soccer fanatic’s eyes — and that didn’t used to be the case.

But let’s not pretend that making a deep run at the women’s World Cup is an accomplishment on par achieving this at the men’s tournament. There simply isn’t as much quality competition standing in the way.

I don’t begrudge members of the women’s team getting pay raises, or even getting what mem’s team members make. They are great athletes. Let them make as much money as they can.

What I hated was the shots taken by sportswriters at the U.S. men during the fight for “equal pay.” To read some of them, you’d think the men couldn’t carry the women’s sports bras.

In reality, the U.S. men hold their own against most of the soccer-crazed world of men’s soccer. More often than not they make it to the Round of 16.

Maybe now that the U.S. women made it no further, maybe the men’s team will be treated with more respect.

Finally, though I’m not churlish enough to take pleasure from seeing the women’s team lose, I admit to being happy that Megan Rapinoe missed her penalty kick. Rapinoe is an anti-American narcissist. Here’s what I wrote about her years ago after she threw a fit because she was thwarted in her attempt to disrespect America:

I’ve seen enough of the U.S. team to know that if there’s an act to get into, Megan Rapinoe, the flamboyant star midfielder, is probably going to get into it. Thus, it wasn’t surprising when she decided to emulate Colin Kaepernick and disrespect America by refusing to stand for the National Anthem.

When Rapinoe was thwarted in her attempt to call attention to herself and to disrespect her country (the anthem was played before the players took the field), she whined about it, calling the move “[expletive] unbelievable.” She then accused the owner who thwarted her attention-grab of being “homophobic” (Rapinoe is a lesbian).

And let’s not forget Rapinoe’s over-the-top celebration of her late goal in the 13-0 blowout of Thailand at the last World Cup — as embarrassing a display of poor sportsmanship as I can recall seeing in a soccer match.

I should add that Rapinoe’s missed penalty kick is not a reflection on her as a soccer player. Anyone can fail to convert a vital PK.

The list of superstars who have failed is long. It includes the great Harry Kane in England’s wrenching defeat by France at the last World Cup; two all-time great Italian players — Franco Baresi and Roberto Baggio — in the shootout loss to Brazil at the 1994 final (like Rapinoe, both failed to put their shot on target); and Mario Kempes, the leading scorer at the 1978 World Cup, in a European club final two years later (Arsenal legend Liam Brady also failed to convert in the same shootout).

Nonetheless, Rapinoe’s miss seems like poetic justice. The woman who’s obsessed with calling attention to herself, will now receive a huge amount of attention even she won’t relish.