Women's World Cup 2023: Retiring Megan Rapinoe makes tearful exit as USA bow out - she says "sick joke"

BBC ^ | 6th August 2023 | Neill Johnston

[Cronos]

She went so far as to call it "dark comedy" and a "sick joke", such was her dismay.

...With the USA leading 3-2 on penalties on a tension-filled night, substitute Rapinoe missed her spot-kick before Sophia Smith and Kelley O'Hara also failed to score in the shootout.

When Lina Hurtig converted the decisive penalty by the finest of margins, eliminating the four-time world champions, Rapinoe was overcome with emotion.

The Olympic gold medal winner hoisted up her shirt in an attempt to hide her face.

Ten minutes after the game, the television cameras picked out Rapinoe being consoled by team-mate Lynn Williams after the 2019 Ballon d'Or winner's dream of ending her USA career on a high were dashed.

"This is like a sick joke," said Rapinoe. "For me personally, I'm just like, this is dark comedy. I missed a penalty."

..."She's actually kind of an awful person," wrote journalist Brad Polumbo in the Washington Examiner. "Rapinoe has soccer skills for sure, but her entitled, flippant, and unpatriotic attitude is the epitome of first-world privilege."

[Extra-Ordinary Objectives]

The women negotiated same pay, but benefits that the men didn’t get. In losing in round of 16, like the men, the US women made more from US federation) than whichever women’s team wins the entire cup.

[kearnyirish2]

I loved it; I’m a horrible person...

[kearnyirish2]

Yes, I felt bad for some of them; that mental case put them in a bad position where anything short of winning the whole thing would be thrown in their faces. Should buy us a few years of peace regarding the “unequal pay”, as their championships were used as justification (though they still generate paltry revenue).