On Wednesday, U.S. women’s national team head coach Emma Hayes revealed her 18-player roster plus four alternates for the 2024 Olympics, which featured the major decision to leave forward Alex Morgan at home — the first time she has not featured on a major tournament squad since 2008.
If Morgan, who will be 35 by the time the Olympic tournament starts on July 25, was the player left off, then Paris Saint-Germain midfielder Korbin Albert was the one who had been on the bubble and made the cut.
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Albert has been a part of the USWNT’s plan since her first appearance last year, as evidenced by her 11 games played, including those in the CONCACAF W Gold Cup and SheBelieves Cup earlier this year. Though she mentioned Albert’s flexibility, Hayes sees the midfielder in the No 8 role. But her inclusion on the Olympic roster was not necessarily a given, for reasons both on and off the field.
“First of all, we know Korbin making the team is on merit in terms of what she offers for us in the midfield positions,” Hayes said in response to a question from The Athletic.
In her press conference following the roster announcement, Hayes also addressed the decision to bring Albert in for her first major tournament despite previous incidents in which the 20-year-old shared anti-LGTBQ+ content on her social media — something she later apologized for after pressure from current and former players, as well as fans.
“There’s no denying there’s been a lot of work that’s been going on in the background to work with Korbin. As I’ve expressed on several occasions, I think it’s really important that everybody in this team understands the importance of not just being tolerant and respectful, and understanding the things that matter to all of us,” Hayes said, echoing several comments she made at the time of the friendlies against Korea Republic in early June.
“Korbin has had to learn, and my experiences with her — this is a young person who understands fully the implications of social media activity. I’m not going to go into that in great detail because that’s between Korbin and I, but the conversations we have had have been to talk about the importance of what we have to be mindful of, and how we are all part of an environment that’s one that appreciates and understands what that can do.”
USWNT players also addressed Albert’s actions in April, with Morgan and co-captain Lindsey Horan reading a prepared statement ahead of a game at the SheBelieves Cup.
“We just want to address the disappointing situation regarding Korbin that has unfolded over this past week. We’ve worked extremely hard to uphold the integrity of this national team through all of the generations, and we are extremely, extremely sad that this standard was not upheld,” Horan said. “Our fans and our supporters feel like this is a team that they can rally behind, and it’s so important that they feel and continue to feel undeniably heard and seen.”
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Morgan stated that the team has also had internal discussions over Albert’s social media activity, and those discussions would “stay within the team”.
USWNT forward Christen Press addressed Albert’s situation at length recently on The RE-CAP Show, voicing her frustration with the limited response from U.S. Soccer.
“You have an opportunity as an institution, I’m talking about U.S. Soccer, to show a good way to create a culture that doesn’t just monetize Pride, but actually protects people’s feelings and psychological safety and physical safety,” Press said.
“And you could actually create that culture, but you have to do so in a way that’s consistent and in a way that’s not reactionary. And instead of any repercussions — because as far as I know there was none at all — it fell on our captains to do a press conference and be expected to have some miracle. But it’s not an individual code of conduct. It’s U.S. Soccer’s code of conduct.”
Another USWNT forward, Trinity Rodman, recently told Vanity Fair that the team supports Albert.
“Having strong opinions is difficult, especially when you are looked at a lot and you have a platform to do so. Obviously, getting booed is horrible, but there’s people that have their opinions and have their beliefs and they’re not always going to match up with those,” Rodman said. “For us, she’s on the U.S. women’s national team and we’re going to be her teammates and support her.
“When she comes on the field, she’s just like everybody else wearing that number and playing for our country, and she’s working her butt off to do so.”
On Wednesday, Hayes fully endorsed Albert as a player and as a person, while stressing that she has felt the consequences.
During those June friendlies, played during Pride Month, Albert wore the rainbow numbers that are used on the team jerseys and participated in the team photos. She was booed by fans at those matches, though neither crowd, in Colorado and Minnesota, fully participated in reacting to her playing or her name being announced.
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“She’s been a delight to coach. I think she’s had a really, really tough time. She’s really struggled, and I think some of that has shown in her performances,” Hayes said. “Understandably. She’s a young person and having to deal with a lot of criticism, rightfully so. She can hear the noise in the stadium. That’s affected her.”
Hayes also stressed it is her job as a coach to continue working with Albert.
“All I can say, firsthand, having spent limited time with Korbin, is that she really is a lovely person and someone who really values the most important things; that she’s spending time working on herself, as we all do, and I look forward to building on that with her. I want everybody to know that my job is to make sure I keep doing that.
“I want the fans to really embrace Korbin, because I do. I think she’s a tremendous human being.”
(Top photo: Getty Images)
