Photo Credit: Jonathan Hui-Imagn Images
Alyssa Naeher is a U.S. soccer legend. The World Cup trophy and Olympic gold and bronze medals speak for themselves. She’s behind only Hope Solo and Brianna Scurry for total caps as a U.S. women’s national team goalkeeper. Her place in the U.S. Soccer Hall of Fame is assured.
Naeher also turned 36 in April. Though she has been the written-in-ink No.1 for USWNT head coach Emma Hayes over the past few months, she has not been her typically dominant self for a while now, recent penalty shootout heroics aside. She is closer to the end of her career than the start of it. With the next Women’s World Cup nearly three years away, now might be the moment to make the transition.
No major international program does this easily. Hedvig Lindahl didn’t relinquish her spot until after UEFA Women’s Euro 2022, more than two decades after she first stood between the sticks for Sweden. Nineteen years passed between Nadine Angerer‘s first cap and her retirement. Andréia Suntaque lost her starting…
