Though the champion will be new, Sunday’s Women’s World Cup final in Sydney will feature a few familiar sights, namely pictures of celebratory players hoisting a trophy with a bed of confetti at their feet. The moment they take their victory lap will be narrated by many heaping praise on the players and the team, and how their win makes a statement about the sport itself.
For the first time all tournament, there will be no other teams to see on the field. Their storylines will abruptly but unsurprisingly fade into the past, indicative of the sentiment that everything builds up to this singular moment of victory. That championships matter more than anything else is a harsh truth of sports; it’s also an overly simplistic view of what happens on the field.
Take Sweden as an example. The team played in their fifth World Cup semifinal on Tuesday, and though they were the more experienced side, they eventually lost to a Spain team considered the favorites to advance to the final. It marked a fourth loss in the World Cup semifinals for Sweden, which elicited an emotional reaction from vice-captain Kosovare Asllani after the game: “I’m tired of crying big tournament tears.”
Sweden’s loss, though, completes a run…
