Megan Rapinoe Explains What Went Improper For USWNT At Olympics

America ladies’s nationwide soccer group didn’t carry out as marketed in Tokyo.

The People struggled out of the gate, dropping their Olympic opener to Sweden in relatively gorgeous trend. The U.S. nonetheless managed to succeed in the semifinal stage, however its pursuit of a gold medal got here to an finish Monday with a 1-0 loss to Canada. It marked the People’ first loss to their North American neighbor in 20 years.

So, what went mistaken for the U.S. on the Video games? Longtime group chief Megan Rapinoe put it in rather blunt terms after the loss to Canada.

“If I may simply say one thing, I simply suppose the gamers have so much to have a look at ourselves about,” Rapinoe instructed reporters, per ESPN. ” It’s not like, ‘Oh, we didn’t play higher,’ and getting on one another, however we have to carry out higher, interval. We don’t have juice as a result of the ball’s banging off our shins and we’re not discovering open passes and doing the easy issues.”

“We will deep-dive into analyzing, and I do know we are going to, however on the finish of the day, there’s all of the preparation you are able to do and all of the techniques, after which there’s the whole lot else, and that’s what we had been lacking. You’ll be able to’t put a reputation on the ‘the whole lot else,’ however it’s simply getting it finished from gamers, from all of us.”

Rapinoe and Co. won’t go away Tokyo empty-handed. They’ll battle Australia on Thursday within the bronze-medal match.