The U.S. women’s team is No. 1 in the FIFA world rankings and has gone 21-0-1 this year, but those facts and stats will mean little or nothing when it comes to next month’s Olympic tournament in Beijing, writes Mark Zeigler. As U.S. captain Kate Markgraf puts it: “Sometimes it’s not the best team over the whole year that wins a big tournament. It’s the team that peaks at the right time. We feel like last year we peaked a little too early. [Coach] Pia [Sundhage] knows that one of our concerns this year is we want to be fresh in August, both emotionally and physically.”
Although the U.S. boasts an amazing 109-3-17 record since 2000, it has only won a single major tournament in that time, the 2004 Olympics. In that time it has outscored its two biggest rivals, Germany and Brazil, by a combined 22-2 in non-tournament games, but during World Cup and Olympic play, Brazil and Germany have outscored the U.S. by 9-7.
Zeigler looks at the contrast in how the Brazilian team is preparing for Beijing. This year it has only played six games so far, and its main stars — Marta, Cristiane and Daniella — are still playing in Sweden with their club sides rather than joining the current tour of the U.S. “These games [against the U.S.] are very helpful for us,” said Brazil coach Jorge Barcellos. “We use games like this to go forward and get better in a month. Every time we play the U.S. team we learn from it.” If they lose now “it’s more important to lose a game and fix a situation than to win, win, win and never fix the situation. But a loss sometimes gives you the opportunity to win later.”