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Rose Lavelle Photo credit: Lionel Bonaventure, AFP
Score (lots of) goals
Should the US Women’s National Team have let up on Thailand during the World Cup? Of course not, and let that be a lesson to you.
T he U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team played their first game of the 2019 World Cup against Thailand in June. Going in, the USWNT was the heavy favorite and expected to win, and win they did, crushing Thailand 13-0. After the game, the team experienced media backlash. Various news articles called the women “ruthless” for “running up the score” and criticized them for celebrating their goals.
Megan Schwartz
off? This is the World Cup after all, not a Saturday recreational game, and, to win the World Cup, you need to play at your highest level for the entire tournament. These same concepts apply to business. Every day, a competitor is targeting our key clients and our project opportunities and they are putting “What’s the point of playing a soccer game at the highest level of competition, the World Cup, if both teams aren’t going to play at their highest level?”
Should the USWNT have let up when they realized they were the better team on the field and had already scored a few goals? Should they have played down to match the level of play from Thailand, so it was a less lop-sided game? What’s the point of playing a soccer game at the highest level of competition, the World Cup, if both teams aren’t going to play at their highest level? But more importantly for the USWNT in this case, when athletic teams begin to “play down” to their opponent, they can adopt bad habits and make mistakes that can translate into future games. Players slack off and underestimate the opponent they are guarding. The other team begins to score and that is how upsets happen. How would the soccer community have reacted if, after eight goals, suddenly the USWNT started sloughing
See MEGAN SCHWARTZ, page 10
THE ZWEIG LETTER September 23, 2019, ISSUE 1313
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