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 Inside Soccer
Posted: Tuesday June 22, 1999 03:14 PM Nigeria's Speedy Striker | Q & A As Mia Hamm got the U.S. rolling in the World Cup, was too much expected of her? By Grant Wahl
Expecting a soccer player to score in every game is like counting on a prospector to strike gold every time he pans a mountain stream. It's possible but very, very unlikely. "You get so few opportunities, and even then, the majority of the time you fail," says U.S. striker Mia Hamm. "That's why everyone celebrates so much when they do score." Of course, that didn't stop American midfielder Brandi Chastain from predicting last Saturday, on the first day of the Women's World Cup, that Hamm would average a goal per game during the tournament. "Expecting Mia to score three goals a game is unrealistic, but one goal every game is realistic," said Chastain after Hamm's magnificent one-goal, one-assist performance in the 3-0 U.S. win over Denmark at Giants Stadium. That said, great expectations and soccer are almost always a dubious mix, especially for forwards. During World Cup '98, for example, Brazil's It-boy, Ronaldo, scored four goals in seven games and led his team to the final, yet his countrymen considered him a failure for not having been more prolific. For World Cup '99, Hamm is burdened by similar outsized, made-for-TV hopes, and in one incandescent game, at least, she fulfilled them. U.S. coach Tony DiCicco, for his part, says he's looking mainly for consistency from Hamm, in either scoring or setting up other players. Hamm would prefer to leave all expectations aside and just play. "Goals help your confidence, and as a forward you feel that scoring is one of your jobs," she says, "but I want to do whatever I can to help our team win. If that means working hard defensively and not getting a shot on goal, then that's fine with me." Still, what does it take these days for a world-class goal scorer to merely meet expectations? And in Hamm's case, as in Ronaldo's, has the bar been set so high -- by the media, fans and teammates -- that it's nearly unreachable? DiCicco thinks so. "No player can score a goal a game for long stretches, not if you're playing at a high level," he says. "I'd love for Mia to do it, but we can't expect that in this World Cup." Certainly it could happen: Hamm carried a seven-game scoring streak into this Thursday's match against Nigeria. But it probably won't: Earlier this year she had an eight-game goal drought. Either way, the Chastain Standard is too high. At week's end Hamm, the most prolific international scorer in women's soccer history, had averaged 0.63 goals-per-game during her 13 years on the U.S. team. Even Pele, the highest-scoring men's player of all time, averaged only 0.86 for Brazil. The point is, even for a player such as Hamm, scoring a goal depends on too many factors outside her control: whether opponents try to smother her with two or three defenders; whether her teammates can get her the ball; and whether, alternatively, they take up the scoring burden themselves. "The good thing about our team is that so many people can score," says midfielder Julie Foudy. "That's a great weapon, and it takes a lot of pressure off Mia." In other words, Hamm could finish the Cup with one breathtaking goal, six assists and a U.S. triumph. If that happens, would her Cup performance be considered a success? Probably not. Would that be fair? Certainly not.
Canadian Star's Lament: Ask Canadian forward Charmaine Hooper if, given the right circumstances, she could have matched Mia Hamm's international scoring record (110 goals and counting), and Hooper has an eye-popping answer: Sure. "Mia has more than three times as many caps [national team appearances] as I have, because Canada almost never plays," says Hooper. "If we were able to get the same number of games, of course we would have players scoring that many goals." Hooper, 31, can almost back up her bravado. Over a 12-year international career, her 0.56 goals-per-game average (31 goals in 55 caps) nearly matches Hamm's 0.63. What's more, having played for Canada and North Carolina State, in the shadow of Hamm's U.S. and North Carolina teams, Hooper saves her scoring venom for the U.S. team. This year she has more goals against the U.S. -- four in two games -- than against any other opponent. The daughter of a former Guyanese diplomat, Hooper began playing soccer at age seven after her family moved to Zambia. The Hoopers relocated to Ottawa when Charmaine was 10, and eight years later, upon gaining her Canadian citizenship, she joined Team Canada. Since then Hooper has become even more cosmopolitan, playing not only at N.C. State but also, until last year, in Japan's L-League. Along the way she learned how to talk the talk in more than one language. After going scoreless against Japan in a 1-1 World Cup opener last Saturday, Hooper met with her opponents on the field -- and spoke in Japanese.
Nigeria's Speedy Striker: While nearly all of the Women's World Cup teams have trouble getting media coverage in their own countries, Nigeria has no such difficulty. More than 100 members of the Nigerian press applied for World Cup credentials, so many that organizers turned away half of them. Why so much interest? Quicksilver striker Mercy Akide, who on Sunday put on a show that surely gave pause to the U.S. team, which plays Nigeria next. "She can make things happen out of the clear blue sky that can change the game," U.S. assistant Jay Hoffman said after watching Marvelous Mercy, as she is known back home, score one goal and assist on the other in Nigeria's 2-1 win over North Korea in the Rose Bowl. Example: Early in the second half, Akide took the ball near the Korean touchline, split two onrushing defenders and launched a shot from a hopelessly acute angle. The ball struck goalkeeper Kye Yong Sun on the hand -- but with such force that it ricocheted into the net. Indeed, Nigeria's Super Falcons may have the most flair of any team in the Cup. Like most of her teammates, Akide had dyed her hair green and white (Nigeria's colors) with the help of goalie Ann Agumanu-Chiejine, a Lagos hairdresser who sports a Rodmanesque platinum blonde 'do. Those colors may be just a blur on Thursday, when the Nigerians plan to run past a not-so-speedy U.S. defense. One thing's for sure: They won't be lacking in confidence. Asked why North Korea used five defenders against his team, Nigeria coach Ismaila Mabo said, "To save themselves from embarrassment." It took Brazilian striker Pretinha two minutes to score the first of her three goals in a 7-1 thrashing of Mexico last Saturday in the opening round of the Women's World Cup. When she isn't flashing her braces-filled smile, Pretinha (pret-CHEEN-ya) is usually talking, in Portuguese, as she was with SI before that match. SI: Pretinha. Cool name. Pretinha: I used to be called Pele, but when I was 15, there was another girl on my team nicknamed Pele, so I got Pretinha. It means "little black girl." SI: That wouldn't fly here. Pretinha: In Brazil it's no problem. SI: Are you a big star in Rio? Pretinha: When I walk the streets, everyone says, "There goes Pretinha." After the 1996 Olympics [in which she scored four goals] there was always a big mob asking me for autographs and pictures. I loved it! SI: How much are you pulling down on your club team, Vasco da Gama? Pretinha: I make 6,000 reals [about $3,400] a month. It's enough to buy a condo and a car. I have a nice one: a 1995 Chevy Corsa sedan. SI: Your jersey has four stars on the chest, one for each of Brazil's men's World Cup titles. If you win the Women's World Cup, shouldn't the men have to wear a star for the women's team? Pretinha [laughing]: I'd like that. Then we could have five stars, and the men would have to wear them too.
Issue date: June 28, 1999
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