Soccer player

Footballer Alex Morgan gives San Diego girls a reason to celebrate

He ruled out details of Nike and Coca-Cola sponsorships, appearances on all manner of shows from Good Morning America to The Simpsons, video game covers and the fact that Time magazine named her one of the people. most influential on the planet.

What forms the cornerstone of Wave FC Alex Morgan as a one-woman tsunami off the coast of San Diego will play out on a more subtle level.

at the perspective level.

When Morgan, the two-time World Cup champion, Olympic gold medalist and forward who has scored 115 international goals on his own, starts connecting with enthusiastic young girls, part of the city will begin to change.

Now there is a sportswoman at her peak at the highest level. Now there is a player who plays for his home team. Now there is a star who awakens dreams and makes them throw the impossible in a trash can.

San Diego has been blessed with legendary boys, from Bill Walton and Phil Mickelson to Marcus Allen and Tony Gwen. Amazing women like Maureen Connolly, Candice Wiggins, and Jill Devers also live in San Diego, but they’ve broken barriers in faraway places.

Rarely does a female star cast such a large anchor, close enough to be seen, heard and touched.

There’s a chance 9.4 million Instagram followers, 3.8 million Twitter followers, and all the noise that permeates Morgan’s world is fading away. It can be a photo or a signature. Maybe a simple wink or a punch.

But for all those eyes wide open in the city, it does happen.

“It’s a game changer,” Wave coach Casey Stoney said. “It’s about girls on the outside looking for someone. I firmly believe that if you can’t see it, you can’t be.

Morgan is more than just a sports star. It’s solid proof that motherhood and a senior job aren’t mutually exclusive, and she cuts apples for her 1.5-year-old daughter Charlie when she isn’t cutting her tusks. She is a very successful businesswoman. She is an author.

Girls, the dreams could hardly be bigger.

“There is never a boring day,” Morgan jokes. “… When I remembered going out in the sun in Los Angeles (women’s soccer games), and going with my mom to Los Angeles for the games, I was like, ‘This is what I want to do when I’m older. This is what I want to be.

“Being that person and giving girls opportunities that other people wouldn’t have is incredibly special and I don’t take it for granted.”

From the start, Morgan set out to break down barriers.

“I remember when I was four or five playing with a sponge ball,” said Pam, Alex’s mom. He ran with his chest forward. We called her Mighty Mouse because she was always faster than other kids.

However, watching Morgan’s play isn’t when mom’s pride explodes. It happens in small moments, so routine that it is impossible to count them.

at the perspective level.

“It amazes me how you can give someone your undivided attention for two seconds and that can mean the world to them,” Pam says. “It can make them feel like the only person there, even for a minute, a photo, a signature, which they easily manipulate.”

“It surprises me a bit, I am very proud that he is a role model and that he takes it very seriously.”

Translated with the free translator version www.DeepL.com/Translator

Alex Morgan is one of the most famous athletes in the world. She is pictured with her Wave co-star Abby Dahlkemper.

(KC Alfred / San Diego Union-Tribune)

While revealing the Wave FC colors and logo on Wednesday, Stoney explained why every little moment can turn into a ripple through the girls in the pool.

“I grew up in a country and a culture that told girls they shouldn’t play, that they couldn’t play, with very few opportunities,” said Stoney, from England who recently led Manchester United. “They told me it was a men’s game and we shouldn’t be playing.

“We were prohibited from using the grounds and the facilities, and we had to fight a lot just to play the game we loved.”

Few understand the impact Morgan could make in San Diego better than club president Jill Ellis, former coach of the U.S. women’s team.

“You think of the talent on the pitch, but also the audience, the person in the community, the player that the fans will see in large numbers,” said Ellis. Bringing a name known as Alex into this community for fans to see was a pipe dream. “

“Can we do it? “

Morgan is ready to push the limits. When asked at the meeting to share his goals for the first season for the expanding club, he didn’t hesitate.

“I think we want to win the championship,” he said.

Cheers echoed through the room before Morgan pulled on his shirt.

“The idea of ​​going to see your heroes live is one thing to see them on TV,” Ellis said. “Now she’s creating this opportunity for the kids who have posters of her on the wall to come see the legend live.

“It’s great. I grew up where there were no (athletic) champions.

Moments later, a group of eight girls gathered around Morgan for a photo. She had interviewed non-stop for over an hour and she handed Charlie over to a relative in the middle of questions.

Morgan smiled for the photo as if it was her wedding day.

at the perspective level.