Few have completed extra for ladies’s soccer than Marta Vieira da Silva.
The 2-time Olympic silver medalist and six-time FIFA Ladies’s World Participant of the 12 months progressed the game ahead by dominating on the worldwide stage for Brazil. With a profession marked by particular person excellence, she’ll have a chance Saturday to lastly seize a serious match championship.
The 38-year-old introduced that she would retire from worldwide soccer following the 2024 Olympic Video games. After serving a two-game suspension for a purple card within the final group stage sport, her final match in a Brazil shirt comes towards the USA with a gold medal on the road.
American ahead Trinity Rodman acknowledged Marta’s influence on the game whereas reassuring the media that the USA is concentrated on returning to the highest of the worldwide stage.
A big motive why many worldwide greats like Marta haven’t gained a serious match is due to the dominance of the USA ladies’s nationwide staff, winners of 4 FIFA Ladies’s World Cups and 4 Olympic gold medals.
Whereas adversaries on the sphere, each side labored towards a standard aim the previous twenty years. The privilege and platform of the USA amplified voices like Marta as they fought for pay and useful resource fairness within the sport.
When Brazil was knocked out the 2019 FIFA Ladies’s World Cup, Marta famously gave probably the most passionate post-match interviews concerning the state of the game and what was required to proceed shifting ahead.
The US went on to win that World Cup and, consequentially, equal pay, setting in movement related progress in different nations’ federations. Whereas the game nonetheless has a methods to go to realize true fairness, the worldwide parity seen as we speak isn’t potential with out the People and Marta being courageous sufficient to battle for what they deserve.
Off the again of two straight main match knockouts, some categorized this as a down interval for the USWNT. A extra correct evaluation is that the remainder of the world has gotten higher, making play extra aggressive.
That’s because of the USWNT and Marta. Their braveness and fervour pushed the game because it pushed again till boundaries have been damaged.
It will be poetic for arguably the best ever to finish her worldwide profession with an Olympic gold medal. Nonetheless, it might additionally really feel proper for the USA to reclaim its throne.
The ending of this chapter in ladies’s soccer historical past is to be decided Saturday at 11 a.m. EST.
