LONDON, Oct. 6 (PA Media/dpa/EP) –
The American striker Megan Rapinoe described as “horrible” the independent report published last Monday and that revealed “systematic abuses” within professional women’s soccer in the United States.
“It’s horrible. Even when you know it, it’s horrible to read it over and over again. It’s been hard on the players, some of them play for those clubs, they’ve been coached by those coaches and they’ve probably been abused in one way or another. by some of those coaches or in some of those environments, or different environments, young environments, whatever,” Rapinoe said Thursday at a press conference prior to his team’s friendly against England.
The star player regretted that they are experiencing this situation “on such an incredible occasion” as being able to play on a stage like Wembley against the current European champion. “The juxtaposition is just ridiculous. We are angry and exhausted, but also together and united,” she warned.
“It’s good to be here together as a team. I feel like it’s really powerful for all of us to be together as a national team and to be able to speak for all of us. Vlatko (Andonovski, US coach) has been amazing, just giving us the space and taking the time to acknowledge what we’re going through, understanding that it’s not just something you acknowledge and move on, giving people space if they need it,” Rapinoe said.
For the international, the national team “is a safe haven” for the players thanks to the fact that they have a coach who supports them “completely on and off the field” and stressed that it has been a “really difficult issue for all of them.”
“Probably, in the whole landscape of women’s sports, nobody wants to see something like that, but I hope that this can be a moment where you say that none of this happened again”, sentenced the OL Reign forward.