From School Library JournalGrade 4-8-In a firsthand account, Miller tells of the person achievements and relates memories of the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team in relaxed, conversational language. Responding to her template-format consultation questions, the young women offer their thoughts and sensations regarding the sport and how they play it. They give honest, practical counsel to aspiring players. They have all faced challenges, ranging from family problems, illness, and injuries to playing disappointments and missing indispensable social events. Some are married, attempting to remainder family life with their careers, while others are divorced or single. Miller’s upbeat tone portrays the women not as heroines, but as ordinary people working hard to achieve their personal best at something they love and enjoy. Some trivia is included such as bestloved foods, movies, hobbies, and game superstitions, adding even more of a personal touch. While suitable for short exploration reports, the chatty style allows for pleasure reading as well. Some of the players are likewise covered in Rachel Rutledge’s Best of the Best in Soccer (Copper Beech, 1998). A worthy addition to collections in need of women sports figures.
Cheryl Cufari, Glencliff Elementary School, Niskayuna, NY
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
Michelle Akers
PERSONAL STATS
Position: Forward/Midfielder
Height: 5’10″
Weight: 150
Birthday: 2/l/66
SOCCER TEAMS
1970s-1980s Cougars Police Athletic League, Shorelake Thunderbirds, Union Bay Flyers
1984-1989 University of Central Florida
1990, 1992, 1994-present Tyreso Football Club, Sweden
1985-present U.S. WNT
Many mornings before players march into trainer Sue Hammond’s hotel room to get ankles wrapped, Michelle Akers is there. Often, Michelle, the author of two books, sits quietly, computer on lap, writing, while Sue readies the furnishes for the day. Sometimes they talk. Both have long histories with the WNT. Both have lots of stories to tell in regards to the early years.
The one regarding their introductory tournament in France is a favorite. The U.S. Men’s National Team, likewise playing in that tournament, traveled with them. A bus picked the two teams up at the airport and drove them to a bed-and-breakfast outside of Paris that turned out to be a damp old house with little hot water. Once there, the bus driver would not support carry the luggage. The women unloaded theirs, but the men disappeared. When the bus driver threatened to leave and not return the next day to take them to the stadium, the women unloaded the men’s luggage, too. Says Michelle, “We necessitated that bus driver. This was a huge tournament, and we weren’t regarding to jeopardize our probabilities of playing in it.”
So much for the glamorous athlete’s life.
IN THE BEGINNING
Most everyone calls her Mish, but when the movie The Lion King premiered, Michelle Akers’s thick mane of sun-bleached curls inspired teammates to call her Mufasa. The name stuck. When she was little, Michelle’s sandy blond shock of curls closely always topped off a body streaked with mud. Her willingness to get dirty was why she played goalkeeper for her initial soccer team. She was eight years old. Her mom was coach. They never won a game. Even then she hated losing. Says Michelle, “I cried after each game. I couldn’t help it.”
At the end of her primary soccer season, the Akers family moved from California to Seattle, Washington. Michelle played on two teams there: firstborn the Shorelake Thunderbirds and then the Union Bay Flyers. She credits both teams with instructing her how to play the game.
It was apparent by age twelve that Michelle Akers had all the right moves on the field. Off the field was another matter. Michelle experienced a good deal of bothered years that begun when it comes to the time her parents divorced. She was in sixth grade. Her voice grows soft recalling the day she and her older brother, Mike, stood at his bedroom window and watched their dad move out. Says Michelle, “I was in truth rocked by it. We both were. I do not forget we slept in my mom’s room that night.”
After the divorce Michelle threw herself into soccer. Her attempts remunerated off. At age fourteen she was invited to join the Union Bay Flyers, an under-nineteen club team. She was also invited to join ODP, but her family couldn’t afford it. The club team turned out to be her Olympic Development Program. Says Michelle, “I was playing up with outstanding players who taught me everything I necessitated to know. I in truth didn’t need ODP.”
In high school she met a coach, Al Kovats, who became her mentor. He coached the boys soccer team at Shorecrest High School and let Michelle train with them. He also helped her find her faith. By then Michelle was playing stellar soccer, but her personal life was falling isolated because of bad selections that led her down wrong roads, a journeying she believes she had to take. She remembers the night Al Kovats drove her home after a practice. Says Michelle, “I sat in his car crying again when it comes to how I screwed up. We’d known each other for a long time by then, so I knew regarding his strong faith. That night I said to him, ‘Ko, I want to become a Christian.’ I walked in the house knowing that I’d be on punishment for the next eighty months, but in some way it was okay. I found something inside me that was more inviolable than anything else. Everything was gonna be cool. I just knew it.”
For the next few years her soccer game only got better; Michelle married for the duration of this time. Then in 1991, after the WNT won the inaugural 1991 FIFA Women’s World Cup, Michelle begun to experience sensations or changes that left her sentiment as if she had the flu twenty-four hours a day. For the next three years, as her sensations or changes got progressively worse, she searched for a diagnosis. During this time — a amount of time she describes as “lower than the basement years” — Michelle likewise got divorced. Finally doctors diagnosed sensations or changes that included insomnia, disability to eat, severe memory loss, and crippling fatigue as Chronic Fatigue and Immune Dysfunction Syndrome (CFIDS). Little was known in regards to the illness. To heighten awareness, Michelle appeared before a congressional committee on behalf of CFIDS victims. Says Michelle, “That was the primary time I said out loud, ‘I can’t beat this.’” This was the firstborn time Michelle Akers felt failure.
Although she describes her playing level today as less than it once was, that level is still good enough. In the 1996 Olympic semifinal game, she scored the crucial tying goal on a penalty kick in the WNT’s 2-1 victory over Norway. Her teammates call her the Grand Dame of soccer and speak in almost reverential tones regarding her, the woman who was introductory among them to be confronted by negative voices insinuating women couldn’t deliver an stimulating game. Says Michelle, “I’ve never determined my life course by somebody else’s opinion. To those who said women couldn’t deliver the goods, I merely said, ‘Just watch me play.’”
ON THE FIELD
Michelle Akers plays forward and attacking midfielder. She compares her position to an American football quarterback. Says Michelle, “I either get the ball and score, or I pass it to a striker to score.”
Until sickness struck she led the WNT in goals scored. Her signature bombs to the net from totally unlikely ranges have been clocked at over fifty miles per hour. Mia Hamm calls her the deadliest free kicker in the world. The press often uses phrases like “a hurricane pounding through” to describe her playing style. Comparisons to Mia Hamm are frequent. Michelle distinguishes their playing styles in this way: “I’m pure effort. Mia is pure grace.”
The senior fellow member of the team is a leader on the field. The role took time to develop. In the early years she wasn’t vocal. Says Michelle, “I used to think my presence and work crusade was enough, but I learned that in order to be a leader, you have to offer advancing words.” A smile curls the corners of her mouth. She winks. “And at times words that aren’t so encouraging.”
Best game moment: Winning the 1996 Olympics. Says Michelle, “I do not forget standing on the podium looking up to heaven. I could see all my family and friends from where I stood.” She pauses. Tears brim her eyes. “It was a glorious moment I’ll always remember.”
Red card: She was red-carded once, in a game prior to the 1991 Women’s World Cup. Michelle points to a grizzly-looking scar running down her left leg and says, “Before the Cup, everything that could go faulty went wrong. First, I fell on a sprinkler head and got this gash for the duration of practice. Then we played China and this player kept whacking the you-know-what out of me. I got the ball, she came up’ slammed me from behind, and I fell on top of her.” The Ref called the foul on Michelle, who said, “I got up screaming, so he red-carded me. Then Anson [WNT coach] ran out screaming and he red-carded him. The two of us watched the rest of that game from the stands.”
Superstitions/lucky clothing/rituals: Michelles only ritual is saying a prayer for the duration of the National Anthem before games.
In the zone: Says Michelle, “When I’m in the zone, just give me the ball. I’ll do it. Just give me the ball.”
Injuries: Opponents recognise when they come up versus the 5’10″ midfielder, there’s no backing down. As much as her aggressiveness has specified her as a player, this same aggressiveness has also worked versus her. Michelle blames “too much aggression” for at least a good deal of of the twelve knee surgeries, multiple stitches, and two missing front teeth she’s suffered. Says Michelle, “I wanted to win so bad that I’d run over opponents even when I didn’t have to.”
WNT’s primary head coach, Anson Dorrance, employed to say, “choose your moments,” but it took getting sick with CFIDS for her to listen. Says Michelle, “Now, if I don’t choose my moments I can’t stay in the game.” These days if WNT is winning, Michelle isn’t likely to do a diving header into a goal filled with opponents waiting to kick it off.
Jersey number: She’s worn the number 10 since college. Historically, coaches reserve the number 10 for elite players like Pelé and Michelle Akers.
Blooper: “I do them daily,” says Michelle. “I’m always putting my foot in my mouth by saying something I shouldn’t say. I likewise trip over my feet all the time. There’s too a good deal of to pick just one. It’s constant, just ask my teammates.”
SOCCER IS MY LIFE
At what age did Michelle Akers realize soccer was her life? She laughs and says, “Last year.” Actually, soccer took top spot from the start, a fact that worried her father. Michelle played soccer as if there were a future in the game long before there was.
Says Michelle, “I do not forget Dad saying, ‘After college, there’s no place else to go, Michelle.’ I knew he was attempting to nudge me into expanding my athletic focus, but I couln’t. My blood and guts were in the game. I followed my heart. That’s how I’ve always tried to live my life.”
Then in 1985, when Michelle was a sophomore in college, her future opened up. The Women’s National Team formed. She joined the roster immediately. When younger players Mia Hamm, Julie Foudy, Joy Biefeld (Fawcett), Carla Overbeck, and Kristine Lilly joined in 1987, they without delay looked to her for leadership. Until sickness hit, she was the team’s most recognized player. Getting sick forced her to alter focus. She explains, I had to come to terms with this very scary reality: if soccer was my whole life and I couldn’t play anymore, what did I have left?” In the time it took to diagnose CFIDS, Michelle Akers redefined her priorities. Although still her passion, soccer now is a means to other ends. “Soccer gives me a platform for writing, sharing my faith, helping kids who need my help, and for educating the public regarding issues I feel passionately about, but it’s no longer my only priority.”
ON INSPIRATION
People who inspire are persons with good hearts, according to Michelle Akers. Like her dad. When her parents divorced, he fought to stay in his children’s lives. He never missed a game. He and stepmom Sue have followed her around the globe. Bob Akers likewise gave his daughter her best advice. She smiles. “Dad has always believed that having fun was the most essential share of this game. Even now, hell ask me, ‘Did you have fun, Michelle?’” Today, his words are lovable and childlike to her. That wasn’t always so. Michelle explains, “I do not forget this one game, I was in all probability nine or ten, we got creamed. I was so mad. I walked off the field, and there was Dad keeping out my water bottle. ‘Did you have fun, Michelle?’ I wanted to yell back, ‘That’s a stupid question, Dad! Of course I didn’t have fun. We just lost!’ Instead, I just stormed off the field.”
Michelle laughs when she describes her mom as “no June Cleaver.” Her mother, Anne, is a woman whose own life showed Michelle that she didn’t have to be locked into any one role. When Michelle was eight, her mom became the original woman firefighter in Seattle, Washington. Says Michelle, “She got tons of grief for it, but her dream was to be a firefighter, and not one thing they dished out was gonna make her quit.”
Offering inspiration to young humans pleases Michelle Akers. In fact, she founded Soccer Outreach International for that very reason. The organization’s goal is to use soccer to inspire the next generation to lead. Michelle says, “I’m always telling kids, don’t worship sports figures just because they play their game well. Look at how they live their lives before you determine to follow in their footsteps.”
ADVICE TO YOUNG ATHLETES
Her counsel is simple. Says Michelle, “If you’re unfeigned to your heart and listen to what your God is saying, You’re going to be in the right place at the right time.” After that, set goals. For those who don’t have the idealisti help systems, achieving goals is tough but not impossible. Michelle explains, “Parents of other players, coaches, relatives are all persons who may help, but they have to know you need it.” To parents, she offers this counsel — make sure that the coaches who have so much influence over your children are people who have the whole person in mind, not just that share that wins them games. Lastly, Michelle echoes her dad’s advice. “Soccer isn’t brain surgery. Have fun. If you’re not, figure out what’s faulty and it. This game ought to always be a joy to play.”
* * *
FACTS
Caps: 126
Goals: 100
Assists: 36
Sponsor: Currently, none.
Coaching/camps: Michelle Akers Soccer Camp, Tampa Florida, 1998; Northwest Soccer Camp, Michelle Akers Week, 1997 and 1998; Michelle Akers Week at Northwest Soccer Camp, Seattle, WA.
Awards (partial list): 4-time All-American, University of Central Florida; 1987 NCAA Final Four offensive MVP; 1991 FIFA World Cup Champion; 1991 FIFA Golden Boot; 1995 FIFA World Cup Bronze Medal; 1996 Olympic Gold Medal; author of Face to Face and Standing Fast.
FAVORITES
Foods: Starbucks coffee, brownies, Mystic Mints, B-B-Q, oatmeal.
Hobbies: Riding her Arabian horse, Vinnie; reading; hiking.
Movies: Mission Impossible, Babe, The Black Stallion.
Movie stars: Harrison Ford, Tom Cruise, Tom Hanks, Rosie O’Donnell.
TV shows: Seinfeld, Animal Planet Channel.
Copyright © 1999 by Marla Miller
interesting book
Great way to learn what makes the USA women players tick