It doesn’t seem that long ago that Christen Press was helping the national team to consecutive World Cup titles. She was unstoppable then, a key cog in the greatest women’s soccer team in history.
Yet she played her 155th and final match for the U.S. in the Tokyo Olympics.
It doesn’t seem that long ago that Press, just 18 days removed from those Olympics, became the first player signed by expansion club Angel City. She was bringing the NWSL to her hometown and was being rewarded with what was then the richest contract in league history.
Yet she’s started just 10 games since then, losing most of the last three seasons to a stubborn anterior cruciate ligament injury that took four surgeries to repair.
Press eventually will be inducted into the National Soccer Hall of Fame, but she isn’t ready for that trip just yet. If her body isn’t always willing, her mind and her heart are still keen on the sport, so Press makes her most valuable contributions now in the quiet of the locker room.
At 36, she has completed the transition from wunderkind to elder stateswoman. And on a Angel City team with 13 players under the age of 25, her presence is being felt.
“It’s a different role. I wasn’t that type of person,” said Press, who admits she has grown into the job.
“When I was 20 I didn’t have a relationship with a senior player like they have with me. I’m enjoying the presence that I have with these young players.”
Press has paid special attention to Alyssa Thompson, the 20-year-old Angel City player whose early career may be most reminiscent of her own, taking the locker next to Thompson in the team’s spacious dressing room.
Both are Southern California natives who played soccer and ran track in high school, led their teams to CIF titles and won national player of the year awards. Both committed to play for Stanford — Press went, Thompson didn’t.
But Thompson’s career is just starting while Press is winding hers down. So the most valuable thing she can offer now is advice.
“The thing that I’m good at is scoring goals. It is an art and I love it,” Press said. “I’m now kind of showing Alyssa how I trained to become a goal scorer. How you can think about goal-scoring in a very nuanced and methodical way.
“I’m learning as I teach her. I’m seeing the ways that she approaches it differently. It’s just kind of a spirit of collaboration I see as a win-win for everybody.”
Thompson agrees, saying she appreciates the chance to learn from a master.
“She’s definitely my mentor,” Thompson said. “She’s entering a new era of her career and she still wants to continue to play and stuff like that. But when she’s not playing, she’s able to [offer] her guidance and support.”
Goalkeeper Angelina Anderson, the team’s vice captain and, at 24, a key member of Angel City’s youth movement, isn’t sure Press fully appreciates the impact she’s having. The extra work Press puts in with Thompson, for example, has also made Anderson better.
“After training she’ll pull me aside and say ‘Hey, Ang, can you stay? I’m going to play a few balls through for Alyssa.’ That alone, dealing with such an elite finisher, is making me better obviously,” said Anderson, who was recently called up to the national team for the first time.
“She’s probably had to change a lot; just her mindset and mentality going through her injury and being older. I think she’s embraced her role and she seems like she’s in a really healthy spot.”
Listen to Press for a moment and the depth of her wisdom, experience and intelligence is obvious. But that doesn’t exactly make her rare in the Angel City locker room. Ali Riley, Press’ former Stanford teammate, and Scottish international Claire Emslie also have played on multiple continents and in multiple international championships and have become mentors to the team’s younger players.
“I enjoy that,” Emslie said. “I definitely find myself saying things to the younger players that I remember getting told and I think it’s important to pass on that information and have those relationships.
“I want to help them as much as I can because they’re going to go on and have even better and more successful careers. If I can help them along the way, it’s rewarding.”
That approach seems to be working. Angel City (4-4-2) is in playoff position through 10 games despite starting six players younger than 25.
“It’s important to have experienced players like Christen around. Especially when you’ve got so many players that are so young and exciting and dynamic,” interim manager Sam Laity said.
How long Press continues to do that in person is uncertain. The one-year contract extension she signed in January ends when the season does and she has a budding business empire to manage, one that includes a wildly entertaining podcast and a social entrepreneurship company founded with former USWNT teammates Megan Rapinoe, Meghan Klingenberg and Tobin Heath.
But if her playing days are indeed numbered, she’s enjoying those she has left. And that may be the most important lesson Professor Press passes on to her young students.
“There’s only one thing I haven’t done in soccer and that’s enjoy it,” she said. “All of my peers retired and I’m still here. I’m still given this gift of being able to appreciate it, play with gratitude, be a role model. And when I think about Angel City and my legacy, I think about ‘wow, what an opportunity to show the next generation that this can — and should be — fun and rewarding and it’s a gift that we get to chase greatness.
“The truth is the other things that I’m doing, from a career standpoint, are more lucrative than playing for Angel City this season. [But] there’s no better job in the world. We get so wrapped up in winning and greatness and titles and trophies that sometimes we don’t just get to be there. Like, I run around for my job. And I’m grateful that I have the opportunity to do so.”
You have read the latest installment of On Soccer with Kevin Baxter. The weekly column takes you behind the scenes and shines a spotlight on unique stories. Listen to Baxter on this week’s episode of the “Corner of the Galaxy” podcast.
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