“She, in some ways, redefined this game,” U.S. Brazil forward Marta (10) moves the ball past Canada midfielder Jessie Fleming (17) during the second half of a SheBelieves Cup soccer match Sunday, Feb. “I think it’s pretty cool to be around Marta.”īrazil will face the United States in the final match of the 2023 SheBelieves Cup on Wednesday in Frisco, Texas. “(To) be around such a good player and a competitive player and a team player, that is something that will help this team going forward, absolutely,” Brazil coach Pia Sundhage said. This article was published (241 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.īrazilian forward Marta is back from a year-long injury, and her availability for this summer’s Women’s World Cup, potentially her last, boosts Brazil’s outlook. Free Press 101: How we practise journalism.We have to be patient, but on the long run I think our work will become fruitful and rewarding for women worldwide. Together we work on spreading the message ‘When women succeed, we all win’, and I truly believe in this. I have had the chance to visit Sierra Leone for example, and spoke to university students, civil society groups and female parliament members. My work as a UN ambassador for the empowerment of women of course helps to support female football around the globe, but it is also a lot more than that. I think this has a lot of potential to change and to become more accepted overall. This is still a very uncommon scenario, whilst many men coach female teams. And for worldwide football I would love to see more women being the manager of male teams. We need the youth teams to become more professionally organized, so more girls in our country can make their dream of being a footballer come true. It is a long-term investment that is needed and doesn’t help if only the current senior team is being supported. It has improved a lot in the past years, but I still think it should be more. To grow Brazilian football, I would wish to get more support from the federation. What is your vision for female football when looking ahead to the future? You have done a lot for the reputation of women’s football, within Brazil but also worldwide, especially through your work as the UN Global Ambassador for Women’s Empowerment. I would be happy if one day someone will be called ‘Marta with pants’. Spain will have their World Cup debut in our group, which could definitely cause a surprise. Costa Rica has some brilliant individual players, South Korea is always a tough opponent to us as they are being very technical and well organized. We have the highest FIFA ranking, but none of the other teams in our group should be underestimated. I would call it the ‘group of possibilities’. If you were to find a name for your group, what would it be? Group D with the USA, Sweden, Australia and Nigeria is called the ‘group of death’. Some people say, it will have an impact on the quality of the games, but I definitely disagree. Eight countries will debut this year, and I feel this makes the tournament a lot more interesting, also from a spectator point of view. I think it is great, as it really mixes up the traditional set-up with always very similar teams participating. How do you like the extension of the tournament to 24 countries compared to the former set-up with 16 teams? However, in the past we have sometimes been a little disorganized, but we have worked with Vadão on this and I believe we have improved a lot in this area. We have many creative players, and we are also patient normally. What is the biggest challenge for the Brazilian team in regards to your own performance? We are his first women’s team, so he was trying out a few things to find the perfect team, and now I feel we are in a good position to impress in Canada. We also have a fairly new coach and he has worked hard with us to be prepared for the tournament. But the team is not only young, the girls are also extremely talented. We have a very young team this year, and our structure has changed quite a long recently. What are your expectations for this tournament? I was so young in my first tournament, but I scored a few goals, and it was an amazing feeling to score for my home country on such a big stage. I have grown up within these 12 years and my role in the team is a different one. But of course my situation back then was very different to now. We would love to win the title, we wanted it in 2003 and we want it now. I remember it well actually, and my big dream hasn’t really changed until now. Do you remember the feelings you had when going into the very first tournament back in 2003? It is already your 4 th participation in a World Cup with the Brazilian national team.
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