San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
U.S. women in World Cup final fulfill vision of 1999 pioneers
A fourth world championship. That’s what the United States women’s soccer team is seeking Sunday in Lyon, France.
But while the U.S. team’s advance to the brink of winning the World Cup trophy may seem familiar, the accomplishment is coming in a changed soccer world. This World Cup has been as globally groundbreaking as
Women’s World Cup final Who:
U.S. vs. Netherlands
Lyon,
Where:
France
When:
8 a.m. Sunday
TV:
the 1999 World Cup was for American women. The legacy created more than two decades ago by a bunch of young women with a revolutionary vision has spread across the globe.
“It’s like the lightbulb finally went off,” said Julie Foudy, the former U.S. star who is covering the Cup for ESPN in France. “This is how we envi
sioned it, in 1999. It’s almost a maternal feeling to see it grow and blossom.”
Twenty years is a long time in news cycles, but not really in the history of sports. The women’s World Cup has been around for 28 years, 61 fewer than the men’s World Cup, which had a bumpy first couple of decades with scant competition and festering corruption.
This World Cup is the worthy descendant of the breakthrough tournament of 1999, which packed the largest stadiums the United States could offer and consumed our country for a month. According to FIFA, soccer’s governing body, the 2019 version will draw a global audience of 1 billion viewers across all platforms.
Countries that until this summer routinely ignored their women’s teams can no longer justifiably do so. Brazil’s knockout game against France drew an audience of 35 million in Brazil, the largest domestic audience ever for a women’s game, breaking the record set in the United States for the 2015 final. France added an additional 10.6 million viewers to that audience, and half of all French televisions were tuned into this year’s quarterfinal vs. the United States. In Germany and Italy, games set record audiences.
England’s semifinal loss to the U.S. team was the mostwatched British broadcast of the year, with more than half of the television audience viewing the game.
Sponsors have followed the ratings numbers and are inking new deals. European soccer clubs have fallen in line, with many of the stars of this tournament honing their skills wearing the jerseys of familiar teams. During the tournament, wealthy giant Real Madrid announced it would finally invest in a team in the women’s Liga, Spain’s top circuit.
“For a little investment you get such a huge return,” Foudy said. “Just look at the Netherlands.”
The United States’ opponent in Sunday’s final, the Netherlands, had never qualified for the World Cup before 2015. Now, the team has a European Championship on its resume and is a win from capturing the World Cup. Dutch players compete all around Europe, with many playing for Arsenal, one of the most established women’s teams in England.
With all due respect to soccer pioneers in Scandinavia and Germany, this summer’s accomplishments are built on the shoulders of the American women, who have never backed down from their vision and purpose. Who have ignored the doubters and the haters and even their belittling bosses who have begrudged them at almost every turn.
“I don’t know if it’s our legacy,” Foudy said, “but it gives you tremendous pride when you see it.”
But it is their legacy, in so many ways. Foudy took advice from tennis star and civil rights legend Billie Jean King in the runup to the 1999 Cup. Following the team’s resounding success, Foudy and her teammates went on strike in early 2000 — just months before their next big tournament at the Sydney Olympics — after rejecting the pittance U.S. Soccer offered. In 2003, Foudy and activist Donna de Varona, a goldmedalist swimmer at the 1964 Olympics, singlehandedly prevented the gutting of Title IX, the federal law that gave birth to the growth of women’s sports.
Threads from 1999 run directly to the members of the current U.S. team. To their willingness to file a groundbreaking gender discrimination lawsuit against their bosses just weeks before they took the field to defend their world title. To star midfielder Megan Rapinoe’s bravado in the face of Twitter attacks from the president of the United States. To their seizing of every moment with unapologetic joy and unwavering confidence.
“The constant question over here from the European media is about arrogance” of the U.S. squad, Foudy said. “I love the answer Becky (Sauerbrunn) gave. She said, ‘Don’t misconstrue arrogance with selfbelief.’ It is them owning it. And I love to see it.”
Foudy runs a leadership academy for girls ages 1218 that urges them to “own their awesome.” To give those girls reallife role models, all she has to do is point to this United States team. They are owning their awesome every day.
They are so good they are creating controversy with their goalscoring celebrations, bringing to mind former NBA star Charles Barkley’s quote about the criticism received by USA Basketball’s “Dream Team”: “It’s not fair, all the criticism we have taken since ’92. We’re trying to have fun. We don’t have to win every game by 40, 50 points.” The U.S. women have won four Olympic gold medals and three World Cup champi
“It’s like the lightbulb finally went off. This is how we envisioned it, in 1999.
It’s almost a maternal feeling to see it grow and blossom.”
Julie Foudy, former U.S. star on how national team continues to break ground globally
onships in 28 years. As coach Jill Ellis brilliantly described her players, “They are vetted in pressure.”
Now they are one win from a fourth world title, which would tie them with the Italian and German men’s teams and put them one behind the Brazilian men. And if you don’t think there’s any comparison, take a closer look at what the men’s World Cup looked like in its diminished early incarnations when Italy was able to win twice.
The comparisons with the men’s game are inevitable but stupid. As veteran sportswriter Sally Jenkins wrote in the Washington Post of the U.S. women: “They don’t need to win a court battle; they’ve already conquered the world. Pay in women’s sports will be an ongoing quixotic battle, for the simple reason that FIFA, just like the International Olympic Committee and the NCAA, is a fundamentally corrupt machine that cheats all athletes of their rightful revenue, and merely women worse than all the rest.”
And as British journalist Marina Hyde wrote in the Guardian newspaper, the men’s World Cup may get four times the viewership but that doesn’t justify why FIFA awards it more than 13 times the prize money ($30 million for the women and $400 million for the men). On Friday, FIFA President Gianni Infantino proposed expanding the women’s event from 24 teams to 32 and doubling prize money and financial support, while acknowledging that FIFA has cash reserves in the billions. Kudos and all, but the women competing would say this is a nobrainer.
The women at this tournament are on opposing teams, but they are all fighting the same battle. A battle historically led by the United States.
“We are the standard bearer,” Foudy said. “Winning is a habit, something we’ve cultivated. We don’t want to be complacent.
“And this team is owning it, in these times and in this culture we live in. They are not backing down.”
Ann Killion is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email: akillion@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @annkillion