ChulaVista
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It's been quite a journey for the 2012 U.S. Under-17 Women's National Team, which ends the year with an undefeated record in international matches at 13-0-4 and in fact lost just one international match during its time together -- that to Japan in Aug. of 2011.
Brittany Basinger played very well at outside back for the USA
But in World Cups, the margin is so slight, and it was a painful lesson learned by the young American players who saw two ties against two tournament favorites -- France and North Korea -- and a 6-0 win over Gambia, prove to be less then enough to earn advancement to the quarterfinals.
Tears after the final whistle
The USA becomes the first team in Women's World Cup history at any age level -- senior, U-20s or U-17s -- to fail to advance out of group play while earning five points. Group B eventually came down to who could score the most goals against Gambia. The answer to that question was North Korea (11) followed by France (10).
Still, the Americans head home with a two-year experience of tremendous growth as people and players. They will take with them these wonderful memories and experiences of being with their teammates, traveling around the world and playing soccer at the highest level for their age group, as they move on to their senior years of high school, into college and hopefully for many of them, the older levels of the national teams. In the end, life is much more about the journey than the destination...
Keep a lookout in a few years for some of these future stars...For WNT fans, there is plenty of soccer left to come. The Olympic champs square off against Germany on Oct. 20 and 23 in a battle between the top two ranked women's soccer teams in the world. We'll talk to you from Chicago...[/FONT]
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Darian Jenkins, the USA's goal scorer against N. Korea, hurdles a defenderhttp://sitelife.ussoccer.com/ver1.0...a1d3a1a8-f607-4c6a-933e-8f2b42b4f8b1.Full.jpg[/FONT]
Darian Jenkins, the USA's goal scorer against N. Korea, hurdles a defenderhttp://sitelife.ussoccer.com/ver1.0...a1d3a1a8-f607-4c6a-933e-8f2b42b4f8b1.Full.jpg[/FONT]
It's been quite a journey for the 2012 U.S. Under-17 Women's National Team, which ends the year with an undefeated record in international matches at 13-0-4 and in fact lost just one international match during its time together -- that to Japan in Aug. of 2011.
Brittany Basinger played very well at outside back for the USA
Tears after the final whistle
The USA becomes the first team in Women's World Cup history at any age level -- senior, U-20s or U-17s -- to fail to advance out of group play while earning five points. Group B eventually came down to who could score the most goals against Gambia. The answer to that question was North Korea (11) followed by France (10).
Still, the Americans head home with a two-year experience of tremendous growth as people and players. They will take with them these wonderful memories and experiences of being with their teammates, traveling around the world and playing soccer at the highest level for their age group, as they move on to their senior years of high school, into college and hopefully for many of them, the older levels of the national teams. In the end, life is much more about the journey than the destination...
Keep a lookout in a few years for some of these future stars...
Continue reading...