Today in Germany, U.S. National Team defender Ali Krieger did something pretty special. She (we think?) became the first American to win a UEFA Women's Cup, basically the Champions League of Europe for women's soccer. Krieger plays for German powerhouse FFC Frankfurt, which defeated Swedish powerhouse Umea 3-2 (after the teams tied 1-1 during the first leg in Sweden) to take the Cup on a 4-3 aggregate. Krieger played the full 90 minutes in front of a German record crowd for a women's match of 27,640, and next to at least six members of the full Germany Women's National Team (probably more, but we don't feel like looking up German National Team players right now). She squared off against a team that featured a number of Swedish National Team players as well as Danish and Japanese National Team players, not to mention...yeah, Marta. She's Brazilian. Frankfurt managed to keep Marta off the scoresheet and got two goals from former WUSA player Conny Pohlers. Krieger, who earned her first two full National Team caps in January at the Four Nations Tournament, has been fulfilling club commitments in Germany ever since, but will arrive at U.S. camp tomorrow and spend a week doing her best to show well and be considered for a spot on the Olympic Team. Krieger has yet to play for the USA in a FIFA youth or senior world championship, but now she has a very unique accomplishment on her soccer resume. See above right.
5 comments:
Good to know that she's the only American to win a major tournament outside the US! This is definitely a great start for her outside the US!
a picture of Ali Kreiger with her team mates I found:
http://images.sportsline.com/u/ap/photos/XHD104052409_lower.jpg
she's on the left!
Such a nice match to watch. (apart from the end which almost gave me a heartattack)
And I can tell you; the Swedish team was pretty frustrated and the end, haha.
well she'd be 1 of 2...Gina Lewandowski plays center back for them and she's an American as well
Ali is a wonderful individual and talented soocer player. It would be also important to acknowledge a fellow American, Gina Lewandowski, who also played the full 90 minute game against the Swedish powerhouse.
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