After their early exit on the 2023 Girls’s World Cup, the USA nationwide crew is in dire want of renewal and Chelsea coach Emma Hayes has been tasked with the job.
The 47-year-old has been a trailblazer in England and observers say the “outsider” may very well be the breath of contemporary air that the US ladies’s recreation wants.
For many years, the US crew has been a pacesetter in ladies’s soccer, having received the World Cup 4 instances.
After successive triumphs in 2015 and 2019, there had been excessive hopes from them to finish a “three-peat” of titles at this yr’s World Cup, however the People had been knocked out within the final 16, dropping to Sweden on penalties.
The shock exit raised questions over the efficiency of coach Vlatko Andonovski, who later resigned, with Twila Kilgore taking on as interim coach.
Earlier this month the US Soccer Federation announced that Hayes will take cost of the US crew two months earlier than the 2024 Paris Olympics after she leaves Chelsea on the finish of this season.
The US job would be the first time Hayes has taken cost of a nationwide crew. However as one of the crucial influential coaches within the ladies’s recreation, she boasts a extremely spectacular CV.
Hayes has helped flip Chelsea into the dominant power in English ladies’s soccer, guiding them to 6 Girls’s Tremendous League titles – together with the final 4 in a row – 5 Girls’s FA Cups and two Girls’s League Cups since she took cost in 2012.
She additionally led them to the Girls’s Champions League ultimate in 2021, the identical yr she was named FIFA Girls’s Coach of the 12 months.
Earlier than Chelsea, Hayes labored in US soccer with Lengthy Island Woman Riders, Iona Gaels and the Chicago Crimson Stars.
Brandi Chastain, a two-time world champion with the US, mentioned it’s an “intriguing” appointment that may problem the USWNT, who’ve slipped from first to 3rd within the FIFA world rankings because the World Cup.
“I’ve heard she’s a stickler for the small print in regards to the progress and growth of the gamers, and a sure type of play,” she mentioned.
“I feel it is going to be an incredible problem for the gamers. I don’t know in the event that they’ve been challenged outdoors of their consolation zones in a very long time.”
Hayes is understood for her direct and attacking strategy however adapts ways and formations to the gamers at her disposal, and observers say she boasts wonderful folks administration abilities.
“Hayes’s type of soccer could be very very similar to her, direct,” Canadian sports activities journalist Mariam Kourabi mentioned. “There’s a heavy emphasis on fast motion of the ball, making essentially the most out of possession and being medical all over the place.
“Quick and efficient soccer is what made the USWNT terrifying for a few years, which is precisely what they’ve misplaced, however is what Hayes enforces.”
Kourabi, additionally the founding father of the SHE scores bangers podcast, praised Hayes’s willingness to make daring selections – one thing she mentioned ex-USWNT coach Andonovski did not do, significantly with substitutions.
“Hayes is especially recognized to show issues round when trailing behind, even when it means taking a participant off solely half-hour in.”
American sportswriter Jeff Kassouf mentioned that Hayes is uniquely positioned as somebody accustomed to the US setup and participant pool however one thing of an “outsider” at a time when the crew wants new concepts.
“Hayes has confirmed herself to be probably the greatest managers on the earth. She is unafraid of failure within the brief time period if it means discovering the appropriate long-term solutions, as she has proven together with her tactical flexibility at Chelsea,” Kassouf mentioned.
“The USWNT wants that greater than ever. The People have lately regarded inflexible and nearly afraid of improvisation, which is required in huge video games.”
Workforce in transition
The US crew is at present in a transitional section after veteran gamers Megan Rapinoe, Julie Ertz and Ali Krieger introduced their retirements. The People boast a wealth of younger expertise in Sophia Smith, Trinity Rodman and others, however they’re but to achieve their peak.
The onus now lies on Hayes to make sure the US can carry out on the Paris Olympics, held in July and August subsequent yr.
“Hayes has developed loads of children into stars beneath her steerage corresponding to Niamh Charles, Ji So-yun, Hannah Blundell and Lauren James now,” Kourabi mentioned.
“She has additionally performed an enormous position in unleashing potential from already established gamers like Sam Kerr, Guro Reiten and Magdelena Eriksson.
“She is likely one of the most versed in teaching each the rookies and the veterans, which is precisely what the present USWNT in transition wants.”
Whereas ex-USWNT participant Chastain believes that Hayes will convey “a breath of contemporary air” to the crew, she mentioned that the English coach can even face an enormous problem in implementing her strategies in simply two months earlier than the Olympics.
“If the communication beginning now in the direction of that date is open, it’s clear, it helps the gamers who’re both on the roster proper now, or she believes needs to be on the roster, then they’ll get an concept of what she needs all of the positions to appear like,” Chastain mentioned.
Kassouf, founding father of The Equalizer, a web site on ladies’s soccer in North America, mentioned Hayes may not have sufficient time to arrange the crew for the Video games, however an Olympic medal shouldn’t be dominated out.
“The coach and participant expertise is there. Crazier issues have occurred,” Kassouf mentioned. “[But] this rent is clearly about successful the 2027 World Cup, and that’s a superb concession to make.”
Trailblazer
Whereas Hayes’ appointment will change issues for the US crew, it’s also a landmark second for the ladies’s recreation.
US Soccer has introduced Hayes will turn into the highest-paid ladies’s soccer coach on the earth, although the governing physique didn’t reveal particulars about her wage.
The Athletic reported final week that Hayes will likely be paid 1.6 million kilos ($2m) – the identical because the US males’s nationwide crew coach Gregg Berhalter.
The transfer could be a serious victory in an extended battle in the direction of pay parity for women in football.
In February 2022, the US nationwide ladies’s crew won a $24m payout and a pledge from US Soccer to equalise pay for the boys’s and ladies’s nationwide groups in all competitions, in a landmark settlement that ended a six-year authorized battle over equal pay.
Chastain mentioned the transfer to make sure pay parity for female and male coaches was “a very long time coming”.
“There have been hindrances earlier … however now, we don’t must justify it to anybody {that a} girl needs to be paid for equal work to her counterpart.”
Kourabi mentioned Hayes has lengthy been a trailblazer in elevating the requirements in ladies’s soccer by advocating for elevated prize cash for competitions, pushing for video games in huge stadiums for bigger crowds, and breaking switch data with signings corresponding to Pernille Tougher and Lauren James at Chelsea.
“The US Soccer Federation was the primary, after many fights, to strike equal pay, fairness, and elevated pay for his or her worldwide groups. That is two torchbearers coming collectively,” she added.
Whereas the US is on the forefront of pay parity for coaches, different higher-ranked groups have an extended option to go.
The German ladies’s coach reportedly makes 300,000 kilos ($377,000) yearly, whereas the boys’s coach is paid 5.6 million kilos ($7m). England’s ladies’s head coach is paid 400,000 kilos ($503,000), whereas the boys’s coach earns 5 million kilos ($6.3m).
Chastain mentioned US Soccer’s transfer to pay Hayes the identical as her male counterpart will push different federations to do the identical.
“I do consider that each nation or governing physique must take word and sit up and say, ‘Okay, this issues. We will’t faux like ladies’s soccer isn’t viable, isn’t necessary, or doesn’t meet the usual of our males’s aspect.’”