Today, May 15, is the fourth and final day of the 2012 Olympic Media Summit and featured the Women's Soccer Press Conference. Four members of the USWNT traveled from their training camp in Princeton, N.J. to Dallas, Texas to participate in the event. Lauren Cheney, Heather O'Reilly, Carli Lloyd, and Alex Morgan represented the USWNT team and fielded questions from multiple reporters.
First off, I was disappointed that the U.S. Olympic Committee seemed to be unable to get Lauren Cheney's name correct. On the Master Schedule for the Media Summit posted online on their teamusa.org website, Cheney was listed as "Megan Chaney." Maybe Megan Rapinoe was initially scheduled for the Media Summit, but their is no excuse for spelling her last name wrong. The USOC has been tweeting athletes answers throughout and they referred to Cheney as "Chaney" on that platform as well. However, they did correct their mistake in their following tweets. It is disheartening when Cheney's name is spelt wrong in such a public forum as the Media Summit for the 2012 Olympics. It comes off as disrespectful and uncaring of women's soccer. Cheney is an Olympic gold medialist and deserves to have her name spelt correctly at an Olympic event. I mean come on, if they needed to check it, it's on the back of her jersey.
Besides the name mix-up, the Media Summit has been a great platform for the USWNT. I like that US Soccer sent Cheney, O'Reilly, Lloyd, and Morgan instead of Hope Solo and Abby Wambach. Solo and Wambach are probably the most recognizable players for the USWNT after the Women's World Cup (I would also argue that Morgan is right up there, with Rapinoe being close behind). Sending players besides Solo and Wambach allows the media and the public to become familiar with other great players on the USWNT. This is a positive for US Soccer because Solo and Wambach may not be able to compete for much longer after the Olympics and this is the beginning of creating the new faces of the USWNT. Also, the more players the media and public knows the better.
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