With the final whistle on Monday night, playtime officially ended. The time for adjusting or experimenting is now over. The Olympics have effectively arrived, and the U.S. women's national team is marching right on towards them.
Well, maybe not marching. It could be argued that they're limping a bit after two tough games: a cagey 1-0 win over Mexico and a frustrating 0-0 draw with Costa Rica. In an ideal world, these would be games where the USWNT would love to build confidence by running up the score. Not this time.
Instead, new coach Emma Hayes got some good insight and information. She changed things around a little bit while continuing to get this team adjusted to her style of management. Despite the looming tournament, this USWNT is still very much a work in progress. The Hayes era has only just gotten started.
It's clear that there are some kinks to work out, and the question is now this: can they get worked out over the next few weeks? This is still an imperfect, but supremely talented, USWNT group; can it be one that goes for gold?
We'll find out in a few weeks, but these send-off matches showed that there's still so much work to do. There isn't much time left to do it, though. France is calling, and the USWNT will be there soon enough.
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