Megan Rapinoe, a star of the Women's National Soccer Team, compared the experiences of the women's and men's teams when dealiing with interference and negativity from Trump. She said:
“So, not only does this [men’s] team not have like a core of older players who are used to that, but none of these players talk about anything, ever, like, for the most part. I think in men’s football, just like in general, there’s not a lot of players who are choosing to use their platform or to, you know, broaden their scope of pressure and responsibility.”
Rapinoe also suggested U.S. coach Mauricio Pochettino’s teams often thrive as underdogs and argued it might actually have “been better for us to play without” Balogun.
“But I think in general they didn’t handle the pressure of the quarterfinal well,” Rapinoe added. “I don’t think they handled just all of the circus that was around their team very well.”
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/megan-rapinoe-world-cup-donald-trump-us_n_6a508de5e4b08b2da6898a24/amp
