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2024 Paris Olympic Games: 'Disrespectful' for USWNT to assume success says boss Emma Hayes
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Published 23/07/2024 at 21:34 GMT+1
The USA's women's football team manager, Emma Hayes, is in place after leaving Chelsea at the end of last season, and her new squad are currently in Marseille as they prepare for their opening 2024 Paris Olympic Games group stage match against Zambia. Hayes took the opportunity to stress that she is not making any assumptions about how far she will progress at the tournament.
Hayes: It is ‘disrespectful’ for USWNT to look further than group stages
Video credit: SNTV
USWNT coach Emma Hayes believes it is “disrespectful” to believe that her team are certain to win gold at the 2024 Paris Olympics.
Hayes is in place as the manager of the USA’s women’s team after she called time on her career with Chelsea in the Women's Super League at the end of the season, with her new job long since confirmed.
The move to international football has afforded her the chance to work with perhaps the most talented squad in women’s football, and they have now settled in at Marseille.
They face the relatively short trip to Nice for their first group game, against Zambia, before facing Germany and Australia. On paper at least, the latter two sides will provide a tougher test.
Discussing the early training sessions in Provence, Hayes said: “We continue to focus on our process. Everyone’s adapted, acclimatised. It took a few days, that’s why we came in early.
“I think some of the details we’ve been working on really have shown in the last training session today, so I’m happy with that.”
She refused to count out Zambia ahead of their match, and noted the threat they can pose.
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“Their ability to transition is better than any team I’ve seen in world football,” Hayes said. “We’ve been watching them, unbelievable, their ability to go from back to front. So, for us, structure becomes essential. That becomes the bedrock, what we do in possession and how we’re thinking about what happens when there is a turnover to be able to get those things right.”
Hayes refused to be drawn into complacency, and kept her focus on the first group game, refusing to assume any success.
“It’s a mistake, it’s always a mistake, when you think or talk in any other way,” she explained.
“I can’t talk about throughout a tournament. You have to win the first game. You then have to compete to win the second. You then have to win the group, and only then can you be in a position to discuss anything else.”
Hayes noted that she believed if observers started to assume the USA would be in Paris for the tournament’s final, it would not be fair on other sides, with many of the world’s stars due to attend.
“I think it’s disrespectful to the rest of the world to talk like that, and I think that the game has moved to a point where that isn’t the case — it isn’t a shoo-in to get somewhere, it has to be earned,” she continued.
“There’s no given right, when women’s football is developed the way it has across the world, that there are top football nations in this tournament.
“We need to reframe our focus and have respect for the rest of the world.”
discovery+ is the streaming home of the Olympic Games, and the only place you can watch every moment of Paris 2024 this summer
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