For Black women, navigating the obstacles of race and gender, stereotype and burden, requires a dexterity that constitutes a whole other layer of athleticism—an ability to contort in plain sight, often without being seen. — Lonnae O’Neal
I am and always have been a reggae girl. I can thank my dad for that.
In our house, he made sure we had the best surround sound system in town. It featured four speakers spanning the basement and the living room, and each came with a booming bass. Bob Marley, Beenie Man, and “SHABA!” used to play for hours and hours off cassette tapes. The riddim rumbled through the floors.
When my older cousins, aunts, and uncles came up from New York City, we always had a dance party. They tried on the latest moves with their heads bowed, Red Stripes high, and smiles sweet as fried plantains. I learned how to bogle in diapers and attuned my ears to Jamaican patois. I heard the husky purr of my grandma’s voice in the gruffy rhymes of Buju Banton. He’s part of the reason why I can understand her on the phone.
Reggae, dancehall, and the island they came from shaped and rattled my bones.
Which is why when the Jamaican women’s national team — the actual Reggae Girlz — hit the pitch for their first World Cup match in the country’s history, my eyes glowed an ethereal blue. You know, the kind of glow that appears when you sit too close to the computer screen? I was excited to watch a group of women who probably knew what warm bulla cake smelled like — who probably knew how to pair its rich molasses flavor and gingery spice with a block of cheddar. That’s family.
My uncles were excited, too. I could tell as I scrolled through my texts.
“The Reggae Girlz a play! Dem need a keepa, Adel.”
I laughed because my uncles always spelled my name wrong. And they always envisioned me being out there on the field, wearing the green, black and yellow. But at this point, I was well settled into my retirement — then, a comfortable fan with no TV. In my apartment, my girlfriend and I cuddled on the couch with a laptop placed on a chair before us, Bluetooth speakers blaring at max volume.
Jamaica was playing Brazil, and I had a feeling that we weren’t going to win this one. Jamaica’s defense looked overwhelmed. Brazil’s Cristiane was pummeling the backline one goal-scoring header at a time. But none of that would kill my underdog spirit. I hopped out of my seat when our goalkeeper, Sydney Schneider, made that epic penalty kick save. I screamed at all three shots we got on net. We lost 3-0, but no problem, we can get the next one, I thought, still a bit jazzed about our Cinderella debut.
But then my Dad sent a message that sobered me up more than I would have liked:
“I didn’t like how the commentators were talking about Jamaica,” he said.
“What do you mean?” I couldn’t recall hearing anything that was off.
They kept saying how “athletic” the Jamaicans were, he said, that the Reggae Girlz were “athletic” in the sense they had raw talent, but were not necessarily exceptional at the game. The commentators hardly said much about their smarts or their tactics, according to him.
“This is the type of subconscious information we consume without questioning,” he said. “You really think they [Jamaica] are there strictly because of athleticism?”
I guessed not.
“Remember how coaches referred to you as ‘the most athletic’?”
I did. Mostly from my time in the Olympic Development Program (ODP) when I was 14, 15 years old. For a while I was proud to be “the Athletic One” on the New York West (NYW) squad. It meant I could jump higher than the other keepers. Run faster. It meant that I had a natural gift that other players would never have.
I’ll never forget one afternoon during a regional camp where they decided the top players from ODP in the northeast. After our last session, when all of the players left the fields, one of the regional coaches — a gatekeeper to the next level — pulled me aside. She told me I had a lot of promise, but I wasn’t ready yet. If only they had a “few more days” to train me. To refine me. They would have selected me for the regional team, she said. Maybe next year.
“Over the next 12 months, find yourself a trainer who can work on your technique.”
I went home all fired up to know I had this potential inside of me. I contacted all the best goalkeeper coaches I knew in Buffalo, NY , for private sessions. But none of them seemed to have the time, and I think my teenage self was too easily discouraged by unanswered emails and voicemails. I felt as if no one really wanted to advocate for me. To take me under their wing.
As I continued to sit the bench for the NYW ODP team, my attention sometimes drifted away from the game. I noticed they kept starting the white girl who eerily looked like a blonde Hope Solo. She was praised for being “the Technical One”. I started questioning the point of being athletic if it didn’t necessarily mean that I was good at my sport.
Of course, if you’re aiming to be one of the best athletes in the world, you can’t allow room for these sorts of thoughts. It’s a distraction. Everyone has weaknesses. You just take all the constructive feedback and digest it. Incorporate it. Fifteen-year-old me probably spent too much time thinking about herself as a victim. I could’ve spent that time getting better, studying the game, learning from my teammates, proving people wrong. “No excuses…” Yes. And….
Compassion.
I understand now why it was so difficult for me to get my head out of that muck. I was frequently hearing language that had roots in a narrative — an almost century-long, false narrative — that said the Black body makes a better work horse than a technical, tactical intellect.
I was convinced my name was written somewhere in those pages.
In her piece “‘Slave Genes’ Must Die”, historian Amy Bass talks about how American scientists began to conduct studies to support these harmful tropes back in the 1930s.
“These studies – which took place in labs at Harvard, Vanderbilt and Duke – produced some of sport’s most venerable racist convictions: Black athletes are more adept at sprinting, more relaxed, make better running backs than quarterbacks, and jump farther, all of which reduced their athleticism to a solely physical condition with no room for intellectual capacity, training nor discipline,” she writes.
This “evidence” has leaked into modern-day sports broadcasting, lending to the cringe-worthy caricature that the Black body is an aggressive (at-times violent) athletic machine.
To put an end to this, we can punish the most offensive incidents. I remember in 2007 when a radio host from CBS called the Rugters women’s basketball team a bunch of “rough”, “nappy-headed hos”. He was rightfully fired. We can even question the type of “well-meaning” commentary that people use. Like when tennis fans talk about how Venus and Serena “obliterate” their white opponents. Call that shit out, for sure.
But what to do about the messaging that has slipped into our subconscious minds? Snuck into our identities?
The Black athlete: a physical phenom “with no room for intellectual capacity”….
It’s hard to admit that this has been a part of my self-image for so long — something I’ve overvalued by thinking my worth only came from my body and its capacity to do, do, do: Workout until you’re the fittest in the gym, Adele. Doesn’t matter how you feel. Ignore the nagging pains. Keep going. Keep winning.
On the other hand, that self-image is also something I’ve been fighting to “fix” or “prove wrong”: Study the dictionary, Adele, so you can sound smarter in class. Take on this job, that job and lose sleep to get A’s in grad school. You got this!
I don’t always like confronting how exhausting this upkeep can be, even though it has clearly made me sick at times. I love to overcome, triumph, and overcome, again. Isn’t that the athlete journey we all fall in love with? And yet something about this path hasn’t settled well for me. I was chasing this sense of worthiness that felt elusive and temporary. There was no room for stillness. Inquiry.
How did we get here?
I really don’t love coming here — not where the mirror’s too close and the blemishes are too clear. I don’t like what’s surfacing and what it’s asking me to give up: overindulgence in who I thought myself to be. What I thought my purpose was as a black athlete.
Which is why I can turn on the TV and tune out the unconscious microaggressions that permeate sports broadcasting. I’ve programmed myself to pretend that everything’s okay so I can just play the game, enjoy the game, succeed in some ways.
Dad, can’t we just celebrate Jamaica and how far women’s soccer has come? I thought.
The answer is always: yes, and….
Because sometimes as I travel around the world playing soccer, watching its players and fans, I cannot ignore race and how it has painted things black and white: often side-by-side like a prideful banner, and yet at times, violently splattered together in a muddling burst of angst.
By the looks of it, you would’ve thought Paris was burning.
There was so much smoke coming down the tunnel of the train station, I was afraid to go outside.
But I couldn’t miss soccer practice. My host family had found me an amateur women’s team to play with, and we were training at Paris-Saint Germain (PSG) F.C.’s facilities. They were one of the best pro teams in Europe. I just had to play — especially when le foot was all anyone could talk about.
This was during the summer of 2010, the year of the men’s World Cup in South Africa. I was 19, studying French in the City of Lights, and even though I was a whole continent and a sea away from the buzzing vuvuzelas of the stadiums in Cape Town, Johannesburg, etc., I could still sense the tournament’s passion stirring in the air. It was thick. You could smell it off a Frenchman’s sweat at a crowded bar, off the sweet and bitter glasses of celebratory wines, and the sour breaths of drunken rally songs. But that day — the day U.S. played Algeria — it reeked of smoke.
That’s what I thought at first. But as I rode the escalator up from the RER, I realized the haze had a more menacing odor. My nose itched. My eyes watered.
It was the remnants of tear gas.
This meant trouble. That there was probably a large skirmish going on outside. This meant the riot police were near with their black uniforms, shields, helmets, and rubber bullet guns.
I felt an urgent pounding in my chest as I observed the other people who’d gotten off my train. Everyone else seemed to remain cool. Still as ponds. I noticed there were no cops blocking us from exiting, So things must be safe, right? I thought, as we all slowly rose to an ominous occasion.
Outside, the road was barricaded. Cops stood in the street, on the sidewalks, guarding … something. Clusters of people, whom I assumed were mostly of South Asian or North African descent, wandered in the middle of car lanes, laughing with their arms around each other’s necks, yelling, talking to their friends, texting. I asked a white French man what had happened.
“L’Algerie a perdu.”
Algeria had lost 1-0 to the U.S. and were officially out of the tournament. From what I understood, PSG had hosted a watch party near the stadium and “fans got out of control”. I didn’t get it. The crowds looked harmless. Raucous, yes. But what I was seeing was the rowdiness I’d expect after any big match.
As I kept walking towards the fields, though, I started to pick up traces of frustration. Rage. Shards of glass winked on the sidewalk like a trail of aching crumbs. They led towards two smashed storefront windows, the original blows that said:
“Fuck it.”
At least to me, anyways because I was suddenly thinking about the French Occupation, the Algerian War of Independence — about resentment.
I had studied up on Algeria’s bloody résistance against French colonialism, European expectations, culture, and language. I read about how Algerians “won” the war but still haven’t escaped the effects of French xeno-Islamo-phobia.
French-born North Africans still haven’t been granted “cultural citizenship”, meaning: It didn’t matter if the rouge, blanc et bleu was stamped on their documents; they weren’t truly considered French in the public eye. They are often marginalized, criminalized, and blamed for terrorism. People named Farid or Djamila had a harder time securing a job than Jacques or Amélie. I remembered how racial and religious profiling is still a norm — that girls had once been banned from wearing hijabs at public schools.
As I stood in front of that smashed window, I reflected over my commutes back from tours of the aristocratic city center. From the Notre Dame. The Louvre. I remembered how the languages shifted on the subway. By the time I got all the way out to the 11th district, less and less people were speaking French. Instead I heard Arabic and other African French dialects. I saw more and more Brown people, some in tunics. Out here, the cars sometimes carried the sweet scent of natural skin oils and butters. I recalled how much of France’s working class was composed of people of color, living on the outskirts in cheaper housing: Les banlieues.
The way I saw it, a win for Algeria against the U.S. would not have meant much in this cultural context. But their final loss in the tournament — a disappointing goodbye — unearthed the bitterness and fury buried within the hearts of a people trying to reclaim and proclaim their sense of worth.
How could they forget how this World Cup journey started?
When Alergia defeated Egypt in 2009, the country had qualified for the World Cup for the first time in 23 years. Thousands of Algerian fans flooded the streets of Paris to celebrate. Young students hopped on top of cars on the blockaded Champs Elsyées shouting, “One, two, three, Vive l’Algérie!” They threw fireworks and sang.
But soon, armed police arrived to break up the crowds, and the party turned into a riot. “Nique la Police” (Fuck the Police) chants roared from the resistance. Stones flew from their hands. The police responded with baton charges and tear gas. Sixty people were arrested and 200 cars were burned that night, according to reports.
Read about the Algerian national soccer team and the events around their matches, and you’ll find that this is a deep and painful pattern.
For me, even catching a glimpse of this turmoil was bewildering. I’d been told so many times how the Beautiful Game brings people together from different cultures and backgrounds; how it becomes a mutual language for those who don’t share the same tongue; how it can create peace among warring parties and foster love and understanding.
France’s 1998 World Cup–winning squad provides a perfect example. That crew is still heralded as the original “Rainbow Team” who stood for the country’s strength in diversity. It featured players who had roots in Algeria (Zinedine Zidane), Senegal (Patrick Vieira), the French-Caribbean (Thierry Henry). Black, white, and Arab players trained and played together like brothers despite the politicians who disowned them, who said they had nothing to do with French ideals.
In her book, Under the Lights and In the Dark, Gwednolyn Oxenham describes how this team captured the hearts of their country:
“With every win, you could feel the growing current; this felt like more than football,” she writes. “When les Bleues beat Brazil 3-0 in the final, the whole county went mad — millions celebrating in the street, chanting not ‘red, white, and blue’ — the colors of the flag — but ‘noir, blanc and beur,’— the colors of the people.”
Soccer heals.
And yet it also reveals wounds. The wounds we’ve covered up and thought had scarred over. These euphoric moments of harmony and teamwork are evidence that a peaceful reality is possible. They can be great catalysts for change and provide people an example of how we can all get along. But when we don’t take advantage of the momentum — when the profound societal reconstruction doesn’t happen — it looks something like smashed windows panes patched up with yellow caution tape.
During that summer I’d spent in Paris, I watched a conflicted French national team (very rainbow it its own right) crash out of the tournament. There was hardly any unity among that squad. The players stopped training together mid-tournament. The coach was fired. After their group-stage exit, French politicians and a certain philosopher called the team a “gang of hooligans,” “scum.”
I don’t believe history repeats itself in the sense that “things come full circle.” But I do see history moving like a spiral. Revolving, sometimes evolving, we continuously revisit these sore spots from a different vantage point, perhaps with more information, possibly with more honesty and introspection. At each turn, we are asked pivotal questions: Will we speak up this time? Point out the hypocrisies (in each other and within ourselves)? Will we make amends?
Or at least acknowledge the hurt?
As I prepped my bags to fly off to Lyon for the 2019 Women’s World Cup, I wondered if I’d have to dodge fireworks and tear gas again. I wondered, for a moment, if there was something particular about French culture that would have soccer fans holding their hearts in their hands as if to bet on blood, lineage, and belonging.
But deep down I knew that we would never see that level of racial turmoil around the women’s game — not even in France.
The civil rights issues in women’s soccer are focused elsewhere. Female athletes are still trying to prove that they can play just as well as the men and that they are worth investing in. I mean, this tournament kicked off with the U.S. Women’s National announcing that they were suing U.S. Soccer to create equity between the men’s and the women’s team. We’re fighting for gender equality here.
Part of my Lyon itinerary included volunteering for a group called Equal Playing Field. This group had invited hundreds of women (and their allies) from around the world to play in the largest 5 v. 5 match in the history of soccer. Their goal was to get into the Guiness Book of World Records and call attention to all of the female athletes who are passionate about this game. To shine a light on all of the women who are worthy of more.
I was so stoked for this.
Feminist movements in sports have united people across color — and borderlines. I couldn’t wait to make friends with women from other countries and exchange ideas, perspectives, and encouragement. I packed my France jersey, my Brazilian jersey, and sadly left my Costa Rican one so that my girlfriend could keep her night shirt. There was something thrilling about stepping into the ring for #EqualPay, especially on a global scale.
In some ways it’s a mission that many of us can wrap our heads around. From my American perspective, it seems that working to eradicate gender inequities is something safer and contained. Or: less violent than facing up to ethnic and racial inequalities, discrimination, and post-colonial trauma.
But is that really the case?
On June 23, Cameroon and England clashed in a physical battle that raised many eyebrows. Cameroon, a.k.a. the Indomitable Lionesses, were one of the most exciting underdogs of the tournament. Ranked No. 46, this team probably wanted to give it their all to beat the world’s No. 3. Unfortunately, their passion turned into a series of dangerous tackles, shoves, and a complete loss of composure. The tensions bubbled as video assistant referee (VAR) decisions — notably appropriate calls — deeply upset the Cameroonians. There was even a moment where they stalled time and refused to play.
England ended up winning the match 3-0.
But as SB Nation’s Kate McCauley astutely pointed out, you wouldn’t have known that from reading British headlines:
THIS WASN’T FOOTBALL — Mirror Sport
SHAMEFUL — Metro Sport
Camerloons — Sun Sport
Somehow Cameroon had stained the reputation of women’s soccer and some of the language being used to describe this “DISGRACE” was racist in tone. (I’m recalling the use of the word “coon” in minstrel history.)
While I would never condone how they played, I was bothered that a group of African female athletes who had unleashed emotions were suddenly accused of ruining an entire sport. Men are never held to the same flame. (See: Zinedine Zidane’s headbutt memorialized.)
There’s this immense pressure for women (especially women of color) to always act cordial, sophisticated and “sportswoman-like” in order to be approved. England’s head coach, Phil Neville said it himself — unfortunately, without recognizing the double standard he was upholding.
“I came to this World Cup to be successful but also to play a part in making women’s football globally more visible, to put on a show that highlights how women’s football is improving,” Neville said in The Guardian. “But I sat through 90 minutes today and felt ashamed. Think of all those young girls and boys watching.”
Apparently, we must protect kids from seeing female aggression — Black female aggression at that — lest they become outlaws when they grow up. We must protect the sanctity of the women’s game so that women can finally receive the recognition, resources, and income they deserve. The question is: Who gets punished in the name of preserving this sense of sanctity?
In this case, the “loony” African woman.
The overall reaction to Cameroon v. England illuminates how racial bias can mar feminist discourse. It shows how people who are otherwise vying for gender equality can easily shift to shame and distance the Other Woman in order to defend the movement’s progress.
Again: There is no excuse for Cameroon’s conduct.
There’s no excuse, but a context that Cameroonian journalist Njie Enow says is important to understand.
Soccer is not seen as a decent career for women in Cameroon, Enow explained. Soccer is a game played by “school dropouts and delinquents.” There’s hardly any money in it. The country’s domestic league has ceased operations several times due to financial reasons. Few of the national team players have had the opportunity to play professionally. The national team itself has also had difficulty staying afloat. In fact, it was completely inactive in 2017, just two years prior to one of the biggest matches of their careers.
“Obviously no one in Cameroon is condoning the atrocious spitting or the late tackle on Steph Houghton,” said Enow. “But is it so hard to understand that these players were distraught at the thought of their dream slipping away when they have worked so hard to get to where they are?”
If England lost, they had their developing domestic league and growing sponsorships to fall back on. The Indomitable Lionesses, on the other hand, would have to return to their homeland and scrape up the momentum to rise again.
So when we think about fighting for equal pay and elevating the women’s game, I think we have to do more than just understand this.
We have to own it.
Even when it comes in sliding at our ankles.
Because what I felt from that team wasn’t malice. It was the type of raw, uncorked frustration that comes from years of feeling like the system doesn’t support you; of being told that you’ll always have to fight to earn respect and that there are only a few chances to do so in a lifetime.
Yes, there are less reactive ways to handle these emotions. But I think all female-identifying and gender-nonconforming people can relate to feeling this way — no matter their level of privilege — because patriarchy is still the order of the day. To acknowledge these feelings in ourselves and in the Other is the first step to healing and supporting each other through global systematic sexism.
Our work together in achieving gender equity isn’t about preserving some idea of “female sportsmanship” and framing it for people to throw more money at its display. That’s to say that women aren’t worthy of more until we act the way we are told. No.
This is about changing cultural perceptions of female-identifying and gender-nonconforming people of all races, nationalities, sexualities, economic statuses, and personalities so that we all feel valued and empowered to live our lives of choice. This work is intersectional, nuanced, inspiring, and sometimes painful to watch.
I mean, it’s hard for me to forget that photo.
The picture of Cameroon’s Star striker, Njoya Ajara, after a VAR decision disallowed her goal. She looked as if she was about to cry an ugly cry. You know, the kind that hurts your head afterwards. A teammate wrapped Njoya in her arms. Others gathered to console her.
I wouldn’t say Njoya and I were friends, but in the few days that I had spent with her, I could have never imagined her making a face like that. She just seemed so stoic and confident — always wearing flyest sneakers. She had this deep sense of faith that amazed me and an optimism that could withstand any circumstance.
We met back in April of 2015 when I was living in Buffalo with my parents. Njoya was playing with the Western New York Flash, which sometimes trained at the high school I was working at. One day as I walked to my car, I ran into one of my former athletic trainers who was working for the Flash.
I don’t recall how we got on the topic of me being able to speak French, but when I said it, his eyes lit up and he asked if I could support one of his players from Cameroon. The Flash was traveling to Penn State for a preseason match, and Njoya hadn’t made the travel roster yet. This meant that she’d be staying alone at the team house in Elma, which is basically the countryside.
My favorite childhood activities out there included finding cattail plants to beat my friends with and eating donut holes at the local Tim Hortons. There wasn’t much to do. I could only imagine how isolating a place like that could be for Njoya. So when Damaris asked me if she could stay with my family for Easter weekend, I didn’t hesitate. Plus, I was excited for a chance to hang out with a pro.
That Saturday, Njoya and I sat on Lazy Boys in the living room. I asked her questions in broken, scattered French. She answered me cooly with her pearly white teeth. It was so clear to me that Njoya was at peace with whatever sacrifices she had to make to become one of the best soccer players in the world. She glowed with gratitude. It didn’t matter if she had to live far away from her country, alone amongst the cattails. Soccer is what fed her soul. And that was enough.
Still, my dad offered to take her to a supermarket in a neighborhood where many West Africans lived. He asked if there was any food she was craving from back home. Njoya wanted to cook goat. La chèvre. Unfortunately, the goat at Wegmans wasn’t fresh. It came chopped up and frozen in a plastic bag and I could tell by the way she ogled it that she was a bit suspicious. Disappointed.
Njoya took it anyway and wandered among the produce. She wanted something specific. I can’t remember what. I just watched her as she picked up various fruits — felt them, knocked them, sniffed them, perhaps testing them to see if anything was on par with what she would find in Cameroon. I watched her try to find her roots among the melons only to find they weren’t quite right.
In that moment, I saw a Black woman in search of connection. A familiar story that I could understand.
My last goalkeeper coach still has a link to my heart.
Any time I think back to playing soccer in college, I can hear him laugh so loud it resounds in my chest. His image is there, too. He had skin so dark, light danced on its surface. And he had eyebrows so thick they could illustrate his every thought. I decided to play at Yale because the moment I met him, I realized: I had never had a coach who looked or acted like me before.
He was goofy.
In training, he would make these horribly corny jokes — the type you only chuckle at because the other can’t stop laughing at their own funny. He was an absolute nerd. And while we didn’t share the same dorky interests (him tech, me anime) I liked the fact that we were pridefully uncool.
Fritz S. Rodriguez.
He had a name that spoke volumes to me because within it contained the layered melange of Caribbean identity. He was of Haitain descent, and we never discussed what it meant for us to be West Indian, but I felt an unspoken understanding. The kind that tethers kin.
Fritz had a vision for me.
Every practice he was preparing me to play professionally. We’d spend hours kicking with my left foot (the “weak” one). He served countless corner kicks that spun backwards, curved inwards then outwards — sometimes into an intimidatingly crowded box — so that I could call and catch the balls that were mine without a hiccup or a fumble.
“You know you can do this,” he told me my junior year.
That lit a fire in my belly.
He was there every time my stomach sank into despair. He was with me on the pitch the game I fractured my arm. The game I tore my ACL. Each time I laid on the turf numb and confused, I could tell Fritz wanted to hold space for me: to be the container for my snotty cries and nervous laughter until the ambulance came or the stretcher was offered. Fritz saw my pain and my potential and I knew he would have carried it all off the field if he could. As far as we could go….
If only he knew how far I have “made it” in my own way because of him. If only he knew how much I began to honor myself through his gaze. I never told him.
In 2017, Fritz passed away in his sleep.
Cause: Unknown. (At least to me.)
He was 50 years old.
I miss him some days.
Some nights, I light a candle, get on my knees and thank him.
I envision my words piercing the ether.
I wonder if he can hear me.
On the phone with my sisters….
Adele: Hey, Maya and Zoe. This might sound random, but remember when Dad texted us about how our coaches growing up treated us differently because of our skin color?
Maya: Mmhmm.
Zoe: Uh yeah, why?
Adele: Well it really stuck with me and brought up a whole lot of not-so-great experiences. But I was wondering if that was true for you? If being Black really affected how you were seen or if this is a story we just tell ourselves?
Maya: Hmm … Well, I think my soccer experience was different from yours and Zoe’s.
Adele: Really? How so?
Maya: I played more consistently, got a lot more positive affirmations, and got the playing time that I deserved. You and Zoe were amazing players, but never got consistent playing time. So when Dad said that, it didn’t have me think about my experience as much as yours and Zoe’s.
Adele: Interesting. Yeah we’re all individuals so it’s natural that we’d each have our own experiences.
Maya: Although, now that I’m thinking about it more … I remember ODP [the Olympic Development Program]. Getting put in that gauntlet. All the girls that got picked for that team, I didn’t think they were better than me. I wasn’t sure if it was bias. But as I grew up, I started working in certain spaces and started to see the back end of it. I saw how pervasive unconscious bias could be. So it could’ve been the same for ODP.
Adele: Sometimes it’s hard to tell what’s in your head and what’s real, right?
Maya: Yeah and honestly, I don’t think I could’ve seen it if bias was actually there. I thought I was above systemic issues because I was good at assimilating with white people. I was good at code-switching. In high school, I didn’t know about microaggressions. In my head, discrimination was someone spitting in your food.
Adele: Yo, Zoe. Remember when we were at that regionals tournament in West Virginia with Dad, and that white receptionist at the motel threatened to call the cops on us if Dad didn’t show his ID?
Zoe: Oh yeah….
Adele: That was wild. She picked up the phone, started dialing and everything.
Maya: Wait, what? I don’t remember this happening.
Zoe: Maya, you weren’t there.
Adele: Yeah. Maya, my soccer team had switched lodging mid-tournament, and Zoe, Dad and I were the last to make the move. When that woman started calling 911, Dad was like, “Yeah, no. We are not waiting for the cops to come and kick us out of this shitty motel.”
Maya: Dad knows how to pick his battles.
Adele: I just never experienced such blatant racism before … I also couldn’t believe my teammates — who were all white, by the way — just stayed there after we told them we had been kicked out before we could even check in. We were the only family who had to stay at a different spot. At least it was a nice Sheraton or something like that. Anyway … Zoe, we didn’t get to your experience. Do you feel like your coaches treated you unfairly?
Zoe: I didn’t really notice it … or I didn’t want to notice it until Dad told me. I felt like I was being cheated out of doing something because I was doing something wrong, not because of what I looked like. When I was younger, I thought Dad was overreacting. Like who would still think like that?
Adele: Like who would still discriminate based on race?
Zoe: Yeah. You know the environment that we grew up in, being in all white spaces and being the only Black person. I put all my faith in these white instructors, so why would they think that?
Adele: I get that. I mean, we have to trust that people have our best interests in mind. We can’t walk around in life all fearful if we’re going to succeed.
Zoe: You know, I’ve never been on a team with another Black person?
Maya: I’m not surprised.
Zoe: Well, except one person….
Adele: Yeah, I was about to say….
Maya: I didn’t have many Black teammates either. Whenever I was the only one and I saw another Black girl on the opposing team, I needed to prove to everyone that I was better than her.
Adele: Haha, really?
Maya: Even now, when I play 3 v. 3, it’s strange. I don’t love it. Maybe it comes from ODP. Usually at that higher level when there are three of you, you have that feeling that they are only going to pick one.
Adele: Yes! That old token programming that pits us against one another. Why do we think that there isn’t room for all of us to be elevated? I mean it can get pretty delusional and weird. I’m kind of embarrassed to say this but for years I used to tell people that I beat [now national team player] Adrianna Franch in goalkeeper drills at ODP camp.
Zoe: Did you really?
Adele: No! It only dawned on me recently to Google what region A.D. would’ve played in. She played for Kansas and I knew this, but it never registered….
Maya: Adele, what?
Adele: And to think of those times that I was injured watching A.D. succeed with such jealousy that I couldn’t even watch soccer for a while. To think I don’t even remember the name of the girl I actually trained with. It was like she was erased the moment the illusion was created.
Zoe: Okay … so that’s deep. I wouldn’t say I’ve gone that far.
Maya: That’s for the best.
Zoe: But I’ve def gotten super competitive with the Black girl on the other team. Though you better believe when we met in the high five line, I gave her a pat on the back. I wish I had more of a Black crew around me….
We did, Zoe.
We had each other.
Remember the three of us playing together on our high school team? Like three ducks in a row: Keeper, sweeper, and middy. We were the J-G Sisters back then. It felt like we were a band of superheroes. We still have honorary white girl members of the J-G clan. What a presence we had at that suburban prep school.
And we had others in our crew… Maybe not in person (which is perhaps the most meaningful) but in the history books. We had so many examples of Black and Brown women who came before us, made the national team, and showed us what was possible.
Let’s name them:
Kim Crabbe: the first African-American woman to make the national team
Staci Wilson: ’96 Olympic gold medalist
Thori Staples: ’96 Olympic gold medalist
Saskia Webber: ’96 Olympic gold medalist, ‘99 World Cup champ
Shannon Boxx: three-time Olympic gold medalist, 2015 World Cup champ
Tina Ellertson: 2007 World Cup bronze medalist
Angela Hucles: two-time Olympic gold medalist
Danielle Slaton: 2000 Olympic silver medalist
Of course, I can’t forget the legendary Brianna Scurry: two-time Olympic gold medalist and ’99 World Cup champion. She was the beginning of the dream for me. When I was ten, everyone told me I could fill her shoes.
Maya, remember when I got Natasha Kai to sing happy birthday to Zoe?
Zoe, remember when we watched Sydney LeRoux take the stage for the first time and how we couldn’t believe how funny she was on Instagram? Now we have Christen Press, Mallory Pugh, and A.D. We have this whole crew to cheer on and laugh with on social media. I love watching Crystal Dunn booty-popping in the locker room.
My spirit leapt when Jessica McDonald was called up to the 2019 World Cup squad. Always a lioness in that final third with long golden locks, she was one of my favorites to watch in the NWSL. I know how hard McDonald’s worked to stick with it: As a young mother, she had uprooted her family countless times while being traded from team after team. She knew in time that coaches would see her true value. The U.S national team did the year she turned 31.
The day of my flight to Lyon, I was scrolling through Twitter when I found a video of McDonald reuniting with her son. Jeremiah had just arrived in France to see his mother play in the World Cup quarterfinals and I couldn’t contain my smile.
“There [have] only been a couple of things I’ve ever wanted in life,” McDonald wrote. “To make it and for my son to be proud of me.”
I almost cried thinking how this was the joy I’d get to watch in the stadium. That even from high up in bleachers I could, in my heart, high five the Other Black Girls who are representing my sisters, my friends, my former teammates and opponents. All of us have had to figure out our own way in this soccer world — sometimes apart. Sometimes together.
Despite whatever biased B.S. still lurks around keeping us sidelined, I can now look at the new faces on the USWNT and feel as if things have changed. This game is beginning to celebrate the Black woman. Just as I’m relearning how to celebrate myself.
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