AUCKLAND, New Zealand — The 2023 World Cup was barely a week old when the U.S. women's national team began to feel it. They felt it during Thursday's 1-1 draw with the Netherlands, and afterward. They are now facing 'a must-perform,' as Megan Rapinoe said, in Tuesday's group finale against Portugal (3 a.m. ET, Fox) from which they need a result to advance; a loss would almost certainly eliminate them.
United States' Megan Rapinoe follows play during the second half of the FIFA Women's World Cup soccer match between the United States and Vietnam at Eden Park in Auckland, New Zealand, Saturday, July 22, 2023. AUCKLAND, New Zealand — The 2023 World Cup was barely a week old when the U.S. women’s national team began to feel it. They felt it during Thursday’s 1-1 draw with the Netherlands, and afterward.
They are part of a program that has made pressure inescapable and inevitable. They have made it so both by winning and by talking. In 2019, Rapinoe admitted, with an equal pay lawsuit on the docket and with bold comments spilling out of their mouths every other day, they felt: “Well, we have to win.” They never quite explicated it. They didn’t even really speak about it as a team. But they understood, Rapinoe said: “This is kind of like a must-win World Cup for us.
And they won it, because they’re accustomed to pressure. They know how to attack and embrace it. In 2019, they even fed off it. “I think it did give us confidence,” Rapinoe said. “I think it pressured us, but I think we also knew that we could handle it, it was almost like a mandatory upping of our level, to be able to match everything that we were saying off the field. In so many ways, we were betting on ourselves, and kind of laying the bet out early. And it was on us to prove it.
“Without the winning, you don't get all these microphones. Without the winning, you don't get the platform, you don't get the media, you don't get the eyes, you don't get the fans, you don't get the ability to say what you want all the time.”
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