U.S. Women’s Team Has Few Surprises
The decisions have been made. The tears have been shed.
Today in Chicago, Coach Tony DiCicco will announce the names of the 20 players who will represent the United States in the third FIFA Women’s World Cup soccer tournament this summer.
Here, although perhaps not quite as bluntly, is what he will say:
Midfielder Aly Wagner, 18, of Santa Clara University is out. Defender Sara Whalen, 23, of the University of Connecticut is in.
Goalkeeper Tracy Ducar, 25, of North Carolina is in. Fellow keeper and fellow Tar Heel Siri Mullinix, 20, is out.
Those were the final two decisions DiCicco had to make in a year in which the competition for places was even fiercer than in 1996, when DiCicco selected what became the gold medal-winning team at the Atlanta Olympics.
“I think this year was more difficult than the Olympic year,” DiCicco said Sunday before the U.S. team’s 3-0 victory over the Netherlands in Chicago, a game in which Mia Hamm tied the world record with her 107th international goal and Brandi Chastain scored twice.
“A player like Aly Wagner is somebody we wanted to have on the roster. I thought Siri Mullinix could have been a good choice. There were a couple of other players too, who really made a statement, including Susan Bush and Michelle French.
“So, in some ways it was more difficult than the 16-player roster for the Olympics.”
What it came down to in the end was a combination of experience, chemistry and the ability of players to play more than one position. The more versatile players had an edge.
“A player like Sara Whalen gives us some offensive and some defensive possibilities,” DiCicco said, “whereas Aly [Wagner] is pretty much an offensive player, an excellent offensive player. We just looked for players who gave us the most choices, the most possibilities, and then made sure we had everything covered.”
Not that that made it any easier telling players they had been cut.
“Some of them, I think just because of my choices of rosters [for previous games] kind of knew,” DiCicco said. “In the case of Wagner and Mullinix, they were pretty disappointed, because in many ways they did enough. They did everything they needed to do to make the roster and still weren’t on it.”
All in all, there are few surprises, even though the U.S. team contains seven players who have never before played in this significant a tournament.
In addition to Ducar and Whalen, another newcomer to this level of competition will be Danielle Fotopoulos, who last season became the NCAA’s all-time leading goal-scorer, helping the University of Florida win the national title. At 5-feet-11, her height as much as her scoring ability earned her the spot.
Also on board for the world championship are defenders Christie Pearce, Lorrie Fair and Kate Sobrero and goalkeeper Saskia Weber. But it is the veterans who will dominate the starting lineup. Consider:
* Seven of the players who will be named today have won a world championship before--in China in 1991--and will be taking part in their third World Cup.
* Thirteen of the 20 on the U.S. roster were part of the ’96 Olympic gold medal-winning team.
* Seven of the American players--each of them a likely starter--have played more than 100 times for their country, led by Kristine Lilly with a world-record 177 appearances.
Lack of experience, clearly, is not going to be a problem.
But is the team perhaps getting just a little old? DiCicco believes not.
During the Algarve Cup in Portugal in March, at a time when he was still evaluating players, DiCicco expressed confidence in his veterans while admitting that he had to bring some new players into the mix.
“That’s always a big challenge for coaches,” he said. “I think that we still have players who are well within their peak. We do have to keep introducing players and that’s why you see a Kate Sobrero out there or a Lorrie Fair or a Cindy Parlow.
“I think we do have a good corps of young players. And then, remember, there’s another corps that aren’t the veterans from ‘91, that have really been around [or at least gotten significant playing time] only since ‘95, so they haven’t been here that long--for example, [Tiffeny] Milbrett and [Shannon] MacMillan and [Tisha] Venturini and [Briana] Scurry.
“So there are more layers to this team than people realize, but we do have to make room for some of these younger players coming up. It’s just difficult. I mean, who do you replace a [Joy] Fawcett with? Carla [Overbeck] is having a great year, I think. Julie [Foudy] is having her best season ever. They’re still at their peak.”
(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)
Women’s World Cup U.S. Roster
United States team for the 1999 Women’s World Cup:
*--*
Player, Age Pos. G/Goals *Michelle Akers, 33 M 139/102 *Brandi Chastain, 30 D/M 92/20 Tracy Ducar, 25 G 23/0 Lorrie Fair, 20 D 46/1 *Joy Fawcett, 31 D 139/18 Danielle Fotopoulos, 23 F 21/7 *Julie Foudy, 28 M 152/30 *Mia Hamm, 27 F 171/107 *Kristine Lilly, 27 M 177/71 **Shannon MacMillan, 24 F 76/19 **Tiffeny Milbrett, 26 F 115/56 *Carla Overbeck, 31 D 142/7 **Cindy Parlow, 21 F 53/20 Christie Pearce, 23 D 48/2 **Tiffany Roberts, 22 M 71/6 **Briana Scurry, 27 G 88/0 Kate Sobrero, 22 D 23/0 **Tisha Venturini, 26 M 121/41 Saskia Weber, 27 G 25/0 Sara Whalen, 23 D/M 32/2
*--*
Coach--Tony DiCicco. Assistant coaches--Lauren Gregg and Jay Hoffman.
*--1991 world champion and 1996 Olympic gold medalist.
**--1996 Olympic gold medalist.
