KevFu
Registered User
Yeah, it was the most cringe thing I've ever watched.
Funny, how people went postal at Alex Morgan saying there's a double-standard.
US Women get drunk and rowdy after winning: Cringeworthy.
Washington Capitals do it and everyone laughs and thinks it's awesome.
I remember people talking trash on the Canadian women’s hockey team for their drinking after winning Olympic Gold one year.
I wonder if there's any reason why both Canada and US have a women's soccer program that far outshines the men's teams.
US women, obviously atop the mountain right now but their men's team couldn't even qualify for the last WC.
Canadian women, usually top 5 or top 10 although they keep falling short on the grand stage. Our men's team, on the other hand, is only now showing signs of potential after 30+ years without a single World Cup game.
The correct answer, as someone else mentioned is how developed and established the programs are.
The women were in with the first wave of nations (along with Germany, Norway, Brazil especially) who started investing hard into the program. The men’s program is 60 years or so behind as tobwhen they started serious investment into the infrastructure of the game compared to most of the other heavyweights in the game.
This, for the most part. Except it’s really more “cultural” than it is “investment.” If you look at the early years of the women’s game and the top contenders…
USA, Canada, Japan, and I’m assuming Norway and Sweden (but I admit ignorance on those two), have societies that have been open to women playing sports for decades, and the rest of the world is not like that. Only just now, HALF of Europe is welcoming women’s soccer as a thing that exists (The other half isn’t and tons of places around the globe still don’t).
US Soccer didn’t really “invest” in women’s soccer as a conscious decision to be good at it. The effect of Title IX was that “Every NCAA school had women’s soccer as a fully funded sport.” We produced more great soccer players than anyone else as a side-effect to colleges spending money of FOOTBALL and having to spend it on a women’s sport to match.
Brazil was a world power for a while, DESPITE lack of investment and lack of acceptance of women playing. It was because Brazil loves soccer and has 300 million people, that they could put together a team of 23 great players despite no investment. That’s what Marta’s speech this World Cup was about. She said: Our nation doesn’t fund women’s soccer, or provide opportunities for women’s soccer, so all girls watching this now, you have to PRODUCE YOURSELF as a World Cup athlete. No one is going to help you.
The US men suck and the US Women are awesome because:
- The rest of the world has developed a high quality system for developing soccer talent.
- US Soccer has not, they let the NCAA develop players for them.
- That broken model can’t compete with the European model on the men’s side.
- That broken model CAN compete on the women’s side because Europe had not applied their development to their women by 2015. Only just now are they starting.
I can’t speak with expertise on Canada soccer, other than to say that US colleges recruit Canada, so I’d imagine the Canadian women are competitive for the same reason the US Women are. And the Canada men aren’t very good for the same reason the US men aren’t very good. And USA is 1 in women, 30 in men vs Canada's 5 in women's, 78 in men's due to the sizes of our countries. USA is picking from 10 times the amount of "players who succeed despite a bad system" as Canada.
As Europe applies it’s development model to the women’s side, the US Women are going to become “one of many good teams” instead of “one of a three or four.” And I’d expect Canada to being falling in the world rankings from 5 to about 12 in the next four years. In 20 years, the USA women will be 5th, Canada 20th. In 50 years, the women’s rankings will look a lot more like the men’s.