Michelle Akers, Briana Scurry reflect on growth of women’s soccer, challenges ahead

\r\n\r\nAt the grassroots level, Akers and Scurry reflected on the role of coaches in helping their players improve their lives both on and off the field. Coming from diverse and sometimes difficult backgrounds, both emphasized the role soccer can play in helping shape youngsters as they mature.\r\n\r\n\r\n\r\n\u201cEspecially for me, because my folks were divorced and that\u2019s a common situation now with kids, their home life can be tough because both parents work, you come home to an empty house, you don\u2019t know where the kid is coming from when they show up at your session,\u201d Akers said. \u201cMy coach, that first coach, he\u2019s the one. I knew I had a place to go to where I was going to be appreciated, it was going to be fun, he liked me, I did good at it and I had something to shoot for next week, so it kept me focused, and again it wasn\u2019t because of his credentials or anything it was because he connected with me and he encouraged me.\r\n\r\n\u201cThat part for me, Mike and all those coaches along the way, and parents and administrators that made that little bit of difference, it added up to this. For me, that\u2019s what it meant. I went all the way to the national team, and played for a long time at that level, but I always knew where I came from and I always knew who helped me and I knew that that was my job to give back. I\u2019m looking at it from my live on the field, and what I try to give back is what I mainly got \u2013 connection, that sense of worth and that appreciation.\u201d\r\n\r\nThat use of soccer to shape the lives of young people is something that is particularly pertinent for African-Americans, a population whose connection to the game has grown slowly but steadily over the last few years, and one where soccer has the potential to make huge positive impact on communities.\r\n\r\n\u201cI\u2019ve been thinking the impact that we\u2019ve had and the ripples that we\u2019ve had in the areas with people you wouldn\u2019t expect as people have watched the game, experienced the game,\u201d Scurry added. \u201cIn the United States, the growth of women and girls of color playing the sport has been less dramatic, but I know for a fact that our 1999 success not only impacted people here but federations in other countries to pay more attention and pay more funding and put more resources into women\u2019s soccer in other countries.\r\n\r\n[ +READ: SoccerWire Q&A: Joy of the People founder Ted Kroeten\u00a0]<\/strong><\/a>\r\n\r\n\u201cWhen you consider some of those countries as being influenced by what we did, and in those countries there are women of color. It\u2019s hard to say a measure of that necessarily, but over here in the U.S., those young girls are having a good time. They are smiling and they\u2019re enjoying it and participating in something positive.\r\n\r\n\u201cI think that is the most important thing, and one of the gifts that this experience has given me is that you impact people you don\u2019t even know. To see someone tell her story to me, people have this amazing excitement about it and they\u2019re reliving it as they\u2019re telling their story. If you look at the face of women\u2019s soccer now at the higher levels, people are impacted and the growth among women of color in particular is slower, but it\u2019s growing.\r\n