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Jimmy Conrad is an American soccer defender, who currently plays for the Kansas City Wizards of Major League Soccer and the United States national team. He is also team captain[…]

America has taken women’s soccer seriously for quite some time, Conrad says.

Question: Why has the women’s U.S. nationalteam done so well abroad? 

Jimmy Conrad: I think our women’s program got started a lot sooner and with lot more seriousness than the rest of the world, I think most of the rest of the world doesn’t respect women’s soccer, whereas here well like that is great, that is awesome and so we are going to put the money and resources into it to make them the best team that they can be and I think we have got a good jump on the rest of the world in that fashion because the rest of the world was like women's soccer, I mean who is, it is all about men’s soccer everywhere and that is all everybody cares about so even now even now they have women’s national teams in place, they are still not that respect that we give our women’s national team here, which is you know disappointing on a lot of levels for the rest of the world, but for here we give our women’s national team the same kind of coverage we give the men’s, we give them the same respect, they have some great players and it is clear now to the countries that have started taking it little more serious in the women’s game are certain be it on our women team so there seems to be like 5 or 6 top teams that US included that are kind of just the time is being switched back and forth now. And we don’t US doesn’t dominate as much now it is like some asians in the US soccer camp that, we made a lots of foot hold in the women soccer spectrum so that is good, it is good only good of our program, I am glad they have some fear because they will run on the show for a number of years.

Question: Is this changing attitudes abroad?

Jimmy Conrad: Yeah absolutely, I think just a touch up about the competition angle I think once the other teams we will say Germany, Germany is got a very good women’s national team, once they have kind of decided you know what we want our German team to win, we don’t want USA to win everything, then they start to be like, then with the competition comes in and the pride comes in and so now they have got a great women’s national team and competes with our team and Brazil as well, just another country that it does some of the same so, I hope that would generate more respect for win at the women’s game, I don’t see why it wouldn’t but you know that being said it could just be a pride thing, I don’t want to loose at the United States and then I mean ultimately it is a good thing all the way around, it just means more exposure for the women’s game, I have a 10th month old daughter at home Julia and so I have a much different appreciation for women’s sports and probably would have otherwise because I want her to at least have that as an option, if that is something she wanted to do.

 

Recorded On: 3/24/08

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