June 30, 2022 • 39 mins
In this episode, we head to underground leagues in New York - to cutthroat games with high stakes, mega talent, big crowds, and cash prizes…where Allie Long plays against the men. This will be her proving ground. Her dream? To make the U.S. women’s national team. She is at an age when many players begin to retire. Will she get called up? Or will she, like so many of the men she plays with, be someone who just missed?
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
To make it. To be great at anything, the traditional
ordinary route doesn't always work. Sometimes you have to go
out of bounds, seeking out a path that looks like
no one else's hustling, trusting your gut even when other
people tell you know. I'm Hannah Waddingham and this is
Hustle Rule, an audio docuseries featuring the untold stories of
(00:24):
women's soccer players around the world, based on the book
Under the Lights and in the Dark, written by Gwendolen Oxenham.
Like the story you're about to hear, I know what
it's like to be just outside your dream, to be
on the brink, to have to keep pushing and pushing.
In my own life, I did have to fight for
(00:46):
every step of my success. Before I got ted Lasso,
I had been hammering at the door of television for
a really, really long time, for like twenty five years.
I always got what I refer to as the also
ran part, but I could never land the main role.
Because I was in musical theater, a leading lady on
the West End stage. People treated me like, well, you're
(01:09):
mainly a singer, and I was like, no, no, no, no,
I'm not give me a chance. This is the story
of a relentless chase, a player's refusal to give up.
This episode is La Gringa, The Alley Long Story. Nobody
(01:41):
Here's Gwen our author. While writing my book, I was
interested in the players so close to their football dreams
who put in triple days to stay ready and still
don't get picked for the national team. Twenty three players
make the World Cup roster. What's it like to be player?
(02:02):
You watch your best friends make the team when they're
nineteen twenty years old. How does it feel to be
nearly thirty, still holding on, still hoping, even though that's
around the age most of your heroes start retiring. But
Ali still told herself one day I'll play in the Olympics.
(02:23):
I'll play in the World Cup. And to do that
to get there, she knew it would take something a
little different, something nobody else was doing. In this episode,
we head to the underground leagues in New York to
cutthroat games with high stakes, big crowds, and cash prizes,
where Ali Long plays against the men. This will be
(02:46):
her approving ground. The environment is something that I have
never experienced anywhere else in my life. The games were crazy, intense.
There's a lot of people, all thousands of people. There's
sometimes I like you could Burley played. They're all like
almost incited, feel like you gotta be pushing people around.
And especially when there's big tournaments like that you play
(03:07):
for ten thows, Like one day, there's music blasting. You
have people in the in the corner selling food and panadas,
rice and beans, beers, drinks, and then everyone's yelling screaming
every shot they take, every goal they score. Literally there's
(03:30):
a guy walking around taking bets with this little chart
and taking cash and kind of just being the bookie
on the spot. There's a lot of steak, whether it's
you know, a check, whether it's just playing for pride.
And the level and the speed of player that they
were playing at was insane. And these leagues there's a
lot of pro players. You see a lot of like
ex World Cup players, ex national team players, Colombian, Peruvian, Paraguayan.
(03:56):
You see all these players in these gyms playing because
they still love the game game. There's an atmosphere that
nobody wants to be, especially being a football and you
see things that you've never seen a wrong anywhere. I
would sit on the silo and I'm like I just
want to play so bad. In her gut, she knew
this was where she was supposed to be. She just
(04:16):
had to prove it. Can't she hang with the men.
It's a good question, and to answer it, you'd have
to know a little bit about how Ali ended up
here in the first place. Let's rewind to suburban Long Island,
late nineteen eighties. Ali has been playing against guys since
the very beginning. She started playing soccer when she was four,
(04:39):
on a team, and she was crazy. She was so
into it. It was a co ed league, and she
would go there and she would run over all the
little boys and score goals and then just jump up
and cheer. You could say it's genetic. Ali's mom, Barbara,
has been playing her whole life, and she passed her
love of the game on to Ali. My mom is
(05:02):
actually such a g She still plays pick up to
this day with guys. She's like the only girl. But um.
Growing up, she played in a women's league, so she
used to bring me to her games every weekend. We
used to go out and on the street in front
of our house and kick the ball back and forth
for hours and count how many times we could get
it back and forth, and it would get dark at
(05:24):
we'd still be playing because the street lights would come
on and I love that summer air. And we finally
my husband Chols and say come on in. You know,
we have to go in now, you know. And when
she was eleven years old, Ali made up her mind
she was going to play for the US women's national team.
Ever since I saw the nine win the World Cup,
(05:45):
I knew right then that's exactly what I wanted to do.
I didn't even think of another option. My mind was set.
I wanted to play for the U s wims actual team,
and I wanted to win a World Cup. There was
one national team player in particular who Ali really lee
looked up to. I love me and him growing up.
I wanted her to sign anything. I didn't care, and
(06:07):
one day she got her chance. Here's her dad, James,
Ali's grandfather, her biggest supporter, brought us tickets to a
national team game against Australia. And as a game came
to an end, I see my wife and a whizz Ali,
(06:28):
I don't know who's elliot. I go to my fall.
I wis all you don't know? So then everybody's like
five deep at the fence at the ground floor of
the stands because the little girls are coming around giving
autographs except for me. She was across the stadium from
where I was sitting, like where she chose to go
sign next, you know what? I thank god. I see
(06:51):
her on her hands and knees and she's crawled between
people's legs like five geep, I'm telling five next, you know.
And I see her climb over the fence. I'm like
what So then I shoot down and I'm behind her
and actually I had to uh push a few people
(07:12):
out of the way, and I see her now she's
running across the field. I literally hopped the fence. I
don't even know how this happened, and ran to where
she was and I was like, can you sign us?
And she signed it and I like hopped the fence
back over and my dad was like, you're out of
your mind, but good job you got her signature. She
is relentless. She perseveres in every avenue and everything she does,
(07:36):
and that's what makes all those champions champions. Her me
obsession is part of why she transferred from Penn State
University to the University of North Carolina. Chapel Hill a
legendary program for women's soccer North Carolina. For me was
where the best of the best play. That's where me
and Hamm went. You know, I wanted to be just
(07:57):
like her, do what she did and stepping on the
same field Mia did and being coached by the same
coach that coached me in hearing what he said to
her and he's talking to me about it. Here's head
coach antson Dorren's describing Ali. I mean she was sort
of a street fighter, and we certainly like that quality
in her. She is very good in possession, She sees
(08:18):
the field beautifully. Her decision making is exquisite. But the
ring that rules the mall is competitive fire and if
you want to have one ring to try to build
your game on, that's probably the most critical one. And
she had that in spades. The summer after her junior
year at U n C, Ali's longtime club coach invited
(08:41):
her to train with his men's semi pro team in
Long Island. And on the first day of practice, we're
playing like five five and it was five minutes or
two goals, So whoever was winning at the end of
five minutes or if you scored two goals. Then another
team comes on and so my team we didn't even
last the five minutes, Like right away the team scored
two goals. It was the third time that this happened.
(09:03):
We're running off the field and one of the guys
in my team was like, we keep losing, like made
a comment under his breath, like, oh, we keep losing.
And as I'm running past this guy to like go
to the sideline, He's like, because you have a girl
on your team, And I was like, are you kidding me?
Who is this kid? I literally hated him, I think
(09:23):
after that game, though my team won every game, like
I made sure of it because he made that comment.
So I appreciate him in inspiring me to like just
shut him up. The guy who enraged Ali Jose Baptista,
but most people call him Botti. She hated me after that,
(09:43):
I guess just just because she was on that team
and they lost so quick. I like blamed her for
it kind of, you know. I mean, I thought it
was also funny, but yes, I for sure meant it.
But they ended up doing well. But I'm like, wow,
she's really good. But despite the rough star, he broke
her down joke by joke play by play, So Botti
(10:06):
is like really funny, and so he would always make
these like little comments and I was trying not to
laugh at his jokes. As the summer went on and
the more we played with each other, I got to
know him off the field and like totally understand the
person he was on the field. I gave myself the
opportunity to get to know him, because before that there
was zero chance that I wanted anything to do with him.
(10:28):
But once I was cool with him, and I guess
like start to like him. I brought that up immediately.
I was like, are you serious, that was your comment,
your very first comment, and he just like thinks it's
so funny. He's like, I was obviously joking and I
said it as you're running by, so you heard me,
just mess with you. I just decided to give her
(10:50):
to give her banter just to see how she would
react to it, and yeah, she didn't take it lightly,
but I thought it was hysterically funny. Ali and Botti
start training to get They're outside of practice, hitting long balls,
talking smack, learning each other's tendencies. I've always been so
impressed with the confidence that he has many plays going
(11:11):
up to a p K. He's always a fifth shooter,
the one to kind of like solidify the wind, and
he just chip the keeper every single time. I think,
just always having fun with each other, joking with each
other is kind of like what was like the foundation
of our relationship. Also like his belief in me, his
support in me. It was unfamiliar from just a guy athlete.
(11:32):
They understood each other and played off of one another
on the field and off of it. Little by little,
they began introducing each other to their worlds. When Ali
left for her senior year at U n C, Botti
and his friends regularly made the ten hour drive to
see her play, unpacking this car out with as many
(11:52):
friends as I can. You know, I remember going to
see uncavers Duke and we got to the so cool,
like the rivalry, the tackling is extra, the cheering his extra.
Just to witness all of that, it was cool, especially
(12:13):
like my friends who didn't go to college, who got
to witness that. And after Ali takes Botti to her games,
Botti introduces her to the games that meant the most
to him, these underground football leagues with men from all
over the world. Football is a fast paced, smaller version
(12:34):
of soccer, usually five aside, played on a gym court
using a smaller, harder ball. It originated in the nineteen
thirties in Uruguay. Football means everything to my family. They're
immigrants from South America. My dad's Brazilian, my mom's Colombian,
so it runs in the blood. I started going to
(12:56):
these leagues to watch my dad and his friends play.
The league's have a rich history of fathers passing down
the game to their sons. Here are Bodsy and his
friends explaining the game's roots. It started as like a
Hispanic thing where families would come together and rent these
(13:17):
gyms out and play. And then they got so competitive
that these families started getting ringers and like giving them
money to help them play with their team to try
and win. And that's how he just kept growing and growing,
and the money just started getting better and better. My
mom would have me in the stroller, would be eating
in banadas, you know, on the sideline, and just hanging out.
(13:40):
My dad, being from Columbia, he came over here and
you know, back then there was no real professional league
in the US, and this was the only place to
play for these guys and there was just so many
good players. They were just insane. That's Mike Pelacio. He
played for the New York Red Bulls for two years
US and he's one of the guys who plays on
(14:02):
battist footsal team. So my dad would be going from
game to game, hustling, playing in these games where each
country had a league. You know, you have the Peruvian league.
They paid this amount. My dad would be on a
team there that would be a game at nine am
and Brent would and then at five o'clock he would
have a game in Flushing with the Columbian League. You know,
(14:22):
he's making five dollars a game. Thirty years ago he
made a good living doing this. My name is Mohammed
Mushriki from Flushing, Queens, New York born and raised. I've
played soccer for the national team of Afghanistan for about
(14:42):
four years and uh I've played soccer in underground leagues
actually since I was fourteen up until these days. There
are crowds you get, you know, wrapped around the field
that they put the pressure on you. You know. Then
we have Diego Boluto. He is Argentinian. Probably one of
my favorite people to be around. His Argentinian barbecues are
(15:07):
the best. But um, he's he just played in Gym's
his whole life. I'm from New York and just a
regular street boiler pretty much. You know a guy that
love soccer. You know. I've been playing soccer since I'm
three years old and and I've been doing it ever since.
My name is annas Vedo. I grew up in Maniji, Colombia.
(15:27):
I was nine years old when I got here. I
used to work at a hotel in the city now
in the housekeeping department. I quit my job just too
that it came myself to play in those leagues because
the money was really good. I call him the King
of underground leagues because he made a killing. He was sick.
The most I've got in the game half an hour game,
(15:48):
but I'm talking about fifteen minute halves. There was Allen,
along with another kid on the team, Jules Escobar, actually
went on to play with the U. S national football team.
When I first told Ali about it, obviously she had
no idea and she was like what she wanted to come?
She was like all about it. She was really excited
(16:10):
and then she came to my first game. I knew
how good Botty was. I knew how good his friends were,
but I didn't know how good the other players were
and how the other teams were. I'm in street clothes,
I am probably getting an impanada. I am enjoying my time.
(16:30):
I watched it in a way to kind of learn
the game as well. I would want to know how
did they just get out of that situation, or what
made them shoot the ball that way, or how did
they get free there? Movement off the ball on the
ball was so intriguing to me, So I loved it
kind of almost as like a student watching and a
fan watching, but of course almost dying to play. We
were scared to play her because you know, she's playing
(16:53):
at a high level and I we didn't want her
to get hurt. That's Alan, and here's Botti. It's not
like a normal soccer game in the sense where the
refs are going to call everything, you know, fouls a foul. Know,
in these leagues they let a little more go than usual,
so there's a lot of body contact. There's a lot
of pushing and shoving. So I was always scared for
(17:14):
something that happened to her or her to get her.
There's always a fight or about to be a fight
almost every single match that I watched up until that point.
So when they said I didn't want to get injured,
I understood in the sense I was like, Okay, I
see what you mean. So for the first couple of seasons,
(17:36):
Ali would just watched the games from the sidelines. She
graduates from YOU and C and then she starts playing
professionally for the Washington Spirit in two do intend. She
even got called up to play with the full US
national team. It did not go well. Second day of camp.
She tore her mc l I attempted to train like
(17:57):
I tried to pretend that I was fine, but I
just couldn't move at all in that moment. I was
obviously devastated. After that camp, I kind of had this
mindset of like, Okay, what do I need to, you know,
improve on? My mentality was like I have to be
so good that they literally couldn't ignore me. Four months
(18:18):
after camp, her knees better. She's in New York watching
Botti and his friends playing a four before FOOTBALLITO tournament
with a three thousand dollar cash prize, and she's more
hungry than ever. One of our good friends gets a
red card right away, and so they're down a player
and I'm just like I can go in, like hello,
(18:38):
first thing she says, like I have my stuff, and
they're like looking at me and they're like no, And
all of a sudden, the other team scores and the
right away I'm like I'm out. I'm getting myself. So
I like ran out to the car. I come back,
and I just felt like I knew that I needed
to play fast. I needed to be confident, and I
needed to go in and like almost like prove my
(19:00):
elf because the game happened so fast. The space is
so small, the ball small, and they're closing you down faster.
The first ball I get like, I make a pass goal.
I remember her going for her first tackle. I remember
clear because it's one of the things I was like
most worried about. And she actually won that tackle and
(19:20):
I was like, okay, okay, she can hang. Here's Alan.
So the guys started talking like talking bad about her,
like oh, you can't even play this, what are you
doing here? Like I'm scared to hit you, like you
feel bad for you? And she made them. Actually the
crowd went nuts. It was just so fun to be
(19:44):
on the court with them, and to be able to
score and like assist and win that game when they
were losing was one of the best feelings and just
they I still talked to them for it. Let me
tell you, Ali played the freaking game of her life.
That's the ag We be done. We made it to
the final. And there's so many kids, little kids, different ages,
(20:06):
you know, girls. He was following us all over the place,
obviously Ali, you know, because all the girls were like
so amazed. The little girls were like, oh my god,
how she played so good. The following weekend, I started
talking to my teammates and coaches and like, yo, let's
give Allie like five or ten minutes and here and there.
And then that's how it went until she became one
(20:27):
of us. You start hearing like whispers and like my
friends on other teams are like, is Alie playing with
you guys? I'm like, yeah, she's playing today. A lot
of times after the big game that day, a lot
of people leave. Everyone stayed to watch us play. And
I think it was more to watch her play, to
(20:49):
see how she would do. To see this girl gonna
play with the men, the whistle about to blow and
the other teams looking at your team and you're looking
at them and you're kind of just seeing, like who's
on the other team. Are they good? Are they not?
Like what's this game gonna be? Every time I'm on
the field, right away, it's like, okay, they have a
girl on their team. They're thinking that I'm going to
(21:11):
be nowhere near as good as them, without ever seeing
me play. It's almost like they will let me have
the ball first, they won't really like pressure me right away.
I'm like, oh, you're gonna give me space, let's go,
And then as soon as I start playing, they're like, okay,
they know that they have to play me as if
I'm a guy. I always loved it because it made
(21:33):
me play like it was the World Cup final. Every
single time I was on the field. Occasionally there'd be
someone who didn't want her out there. And it was
a playoff match, so the game was intense. Loser goes
home and we're playing like older guys. And I played
a one touch passed and he kind of just came
in right behind me like hit me a little bit late,
(21:55):
and I said something to him back, like are you
serious or what do you doing? And he like responded
in Spanish like go play with dolls, and actually didn't
know what dolls translation was in Spanish. All of a sudden,
the guys are like in his face and I'm like,
what do you say? What do you say? And right
away I think bati or someone said to me, he
(22:18):
told you go play with dolls. I was like, no,
he didn't, and I'm kidding me. Um, but yeah, so
after that, I was like, oh, I'm gonna like, I
have to just like score as many goals as possible. Um.
We won, and I don't know if I scored that many,
but I scored a couple and I think I said like,
you go play with dolls. At the end, I didn't
even know how to pronounce the word dolls. But guys
(22:38):
like that were the exception. For the most part, she
won everybody over. Every time she touched the ball was like,
oh she made it a past. It was like oh um.
And then as as time went on, and all you
hear is la gringa, la gringa, which means like a
little white girl, a white girl, you know, a blonde girl.
Like I'll get the ball and I'll make up the
(22:58):
most basic past. I think initially they're like kind of
whistling like, oh, she completed her past a condescending whistle
in away um, but also like cheering for me too.
It's a weird it's a weird feeling um. And then
once they could tell that I can play, it was
like we want to watch her play this whole time,
like put her in, keep her in um. Any time
(23:20):
I did anything, they would cheer, clap, yell at me
um in Spanish. It definitely started as kind of like like, oh,
good for her, you know, she's playing cool. Let's cheer
for the girl. And then as I earned the respect
or as the game played on, then it was more
(23:41):
of like, okay, like we want to watch her play.
There's been times where the gym is packed and we're down,
we go down early, and then ADDIE's scoring a goal here,
two goals here, three goals here, and the gym was
going crazy, and then they're making fun of the other
(24:01):
team because of girls scoring on them. She would put
on magic. She likes fit footwork and all of that,
and she should put on the show. Her dream, of course,
is still to make the national team. After the Washington Spirit,
she plays for New Jersey Sky Blue. Then for Paris
Saint German, but she always comes back here to these
(24:21):
gyms across Queens. These games are what she thinks will
get her there. But two thousand and eleven passes without
getting called up. In two thousand and twelve, she didn't
get called up. In two thousand and thirteen, she's drafted
to the Portland Thorns, where she will play with some
of the best players in the world, Christine Sinclair, Alex Morgan,
(24:44):
Tobin Heath. She plays more minutes than any other player
on the team and they win the championship. Still she
does not get called up. All the football guys pay attention.
They call her or text when she scores, when she wins,
when she loses. To me, she's she's like a sister.
(25:06):
I call her sister. I follow all her games. You know,
after the game, you know, sister, what an amazing game
you did? You know, amazing you play? Sick, keep it up,
it is going to come. That's diego. I've seen how
much work she put on to be on the Nation
Room team, and I remember her getting to a point
of being, you know, frustrating, because she'd be like, what
(25:28):
else do I gotta do? I used to tell her.
I was like, listen, it's gonna come no matter what.
You know, It's just a matter of time. And then
the U S women's national team gets a new coach
and in May two and fourteen, after years of waiting,
Ali gets an invitation to the national team training camp
(25:48):
for long ass years. This time, she doesn't get injured,
she plays well in the first camp, and she gets
called into another. She is in the running for a
World Cup roster spot. At the end of the January camp,
just a few months away from the World Cup, Ali
(26:11):
and head coach Jellalis have a meeting. She sat me
down and she was like, you're not in my plans
for this World Cup. It takes experience to win these things,
people that have been in these situations under pressure. And
that was her deciding factor in that moment. And so
the camp was in l A. I flew home to
New York. I think I cried the entire flight. I
(26:33):
think the person next to me felt so bad for me.
I'm pretty sure they handed me tissues midflight. It was
horrible to know that I'm so close. That was my dream.
It only happens every four years. The US woman's side
went on to win the World Cup. Ali watches from
home as her friends become champions. It was hard and
(27:00):
at the same time like I want nothing but success
for them and I want them to be the best.
So it was a bittersweet balance for sure. I remember
when she was trying to figure out a way to
get some attention to make the US full national team.
We would talk all the time. That's hands in durance again.
Ali's coach at U n C, and she kept saying,
you know, and what do I need to do? What
(27:21):
do I need to do? What do I need to do?
I finally said, well, Ali, let me give you the
bottom line. If you score goals and create goals, it's undeniable.
You're gonna make it the next season playing in the NWSL,
Ali has an even bigger chip on her shoulder. When
you go to the World Cup, it's a twenty three
man roster. When you go to the Olympics for the
(27:43):
next year, it's an a te man roster. And so
like the chances of me making if I didn't make
the World Cup team at twenty three players, they just wanted,
why are you going to change much to an a
tea man roster? Um? You know, everyone told me basically
like be impossible and so, but I kind of like that,
(28:05):
Like I enjoyed them telling me that there's no chance.
That season, she's named the team's most valuable player, and
as a defensive midfielder, a position that doesn't typically score
that much, she is the NWSL's second leading goal scorer,
but again she doesn't get called in. In January of
(28:26):
two thou and sixteen, there's a national team residency camp
and of the players invited, there are ten new faces.
Ali isn't one of them. It was one of the
hardest things to kind of feel and deal with at
that time. That's when she got stronger, she got quicker,
(28:52):
she got fitter, and I feel like that's when she
became an all around player, the best, so the best.
I was literally going to make this team or I
was going to die trying. She keeps training, keeps putting
in the double and triple days just in case, and
(29:15):
as the next NWSL preseason begins, she's still playing like
an m v P. Even among international stars like Almondine
Henri and Lindsey Horan. I felt the best, I've ever felt,
the fittest, strongest, just on fire, you know, my speed
of play was the best it's ever been. And before
(29:37):
we even played our first game, I get an email
from the USIM's national team saying that I was invited
into the next camp. We're driving to a team bonding
experience with the Portland Thorns and I'm in the back
of the van with Tobin and I just like show
her my phone and she was freaking out, but silently
(29:57):
freaking out because she didn't want everyone in the bus
to be like what happened. And I literally like cried
when I got it. And I couldn't believe it, but
I could because like I felt like I knew this
was going to happen. I knew that I that like,
once I got my chance, that I was gonna absolutely
make the most of it. On April six, the United
States plays Columbia in a friendly and Ali starts in
(30:20):
the center of the midfield. This game, everything is on
the line. This is her chance to prove she belongs
in the stands. Ali's parents and Botty, Diego and Alan
from the NYC footsal Leagues make up the Ali Fan Club.
I remember it like yesterday, to be honest, it's freezing.
(30:42):
I'm talking about freezing cold. Alie's like on the brink
of making the team, not making the team. Then in
the thirty second minute, it's Ali's first international goal and
there's a second goal not at all maxit to us,
(31:04):
it's her fust internet show goal gives the U s
A a two to nothing lead. Yeah, so if it's
start so long as the USA, but she's not done yet.
Second goal. That when she scored one goal, we were
(31:25):
like yes, And then she scored another, we were like,
she made it. That was like the best game I've
ever sat through with her because she did so well
and we knew that that was going to be her
beginning on the team. But we went in saying we're
throwing beer, we're throwing water, we're jumping, we're hugging, we're yelling,
you name it, we were doing it. I think that
(31:49):
game she put herself on that roster and she was
being there and being able to witness that all the
hard work it in, all those days you were crying,
all those days you didn't want to wake up, all
the days you didn't want to run in the snow,
train in the rain, Just like all those days was
(32:10):
worth it. And you feel that every single player in
those gyms. I have so much gratitude for all of them,
even though they made it extremely difficult. They gave me
um no room to mess up. They held me to
(32:31):
the highest standard, and sometimes I hated them, but at
the end of the day, it made me better. After
two more friendlies, Jill l S tells everyone she'll give
them a call to let them know who will be
going to the Olympics. When I saw her name on
my phone, I wasn't nervous, but I felt like I
(32:55):
did everything I can and at this point her decisions
may it so I just have to accept it. And
you know, she said, congratulations, you made the Olympic roster,
and she's like, I'm so proud of you. You earned it.
And I started to cry, like on the phone. I
was like tearing, and she was like, she started like
(33:15):
giggling a little because it's I guess, like when I
play soccer, I'm so competitive and so tears aren't like
the first thing you would think of when you think
of me in a sense, So you know, I started
tearing and she like knew and I guess in that
moment how much that meant to me and bought to
next to me just like gave me hug, and he
was like, I'm so proud of you, Like, now, let's winning.
(33:38):
I was crying tears of happiness. And when the football
guys found out she was going to the steen Rio
de Janeiro Olympics, they were so proud, so happy. You know,
they're posting in anywhere on all their social media, like
they're so outwardly proud and supportive of me and my success.
(34:00):
And they always joke with me. It's like because I
played with them, that's why I am where I am.
And now, at age twenty nine, Ali is a starter
in her first major national team game at the Rio Olympics.
Her family is there to watch. You can't believe that's
where you are, you know, in Brazil and she was
(34:22):
starting on the Olympic team. This girl has worked her
ass off and he made me cry. Here he is
coming down my eyes, saying down this is what she's
worked her as flor entire life and it's got the fruition.
(34:42):
And against France, Ali is named player of the game.
The US ends up losing to Sweden in the quarterfinals,
but Ali's dream, the one she's had since she was
eleven isn't over yet. She still wants to win a
World Cup, and this time in nineteen she did all
(35:07):
the work, all the years of training. It finally paid
off Frali and for Betty. I mean, I basically lived
my dream through Ali, with her making the squad that
was one dream checked off, and then playing in the
(35:28):
World Cup that was another dream checked off, and then
actually winning the World Cup. That is crazy to say
Ali won the World Cup. I feel like I won
the World Cup when I looked back at what my
goals were and where I started and the path that
(35:50):
I took in almost what was set forth for me
to get me to where I am today. I think
that playing in these leagues, the relationship with Botty, all
of that essentially changed my life for the better and
kind of instilled this passion, this joy, this sense of
this culture that like I never really knew existed and
(36:12):
allowing me to play in these leads with them and
everyone wanted me to make the national team, goalie Olympics,
win a World Cup that was almost the guy's dream
as much as it was my dream. And so you know,
their impact, their friendship, their support has made me the
player am today. These games made her tough. These games
(36:36):
further honed that quality her parents picked up on back
when she was ten, Her refusal to say no, her
competitive fire. Ali long is relentless, and seeing the hard
scrabble experiences of these guys, some who got a chance,
some who did not, made her fight all the more
for her own. Yet, making the national team is not
(36:58):
really what this story is about out because no matter
how far you do or do not get, a professional
sports career always eventually ends. But as Italian writer Cristiano
Calvina once told Gwen, football will give you much more
than you could ever give it. We're all trying to
(37:19):
find our place, to find our people. That may be
the whole point of everything, and that's what Ali and
so many others found thanks to this beautiful game. Yes
until like I'm literally carried off the field and I
physically cannot move, I'm going to play forever. Join us
(37:43):
for the next episode The mother Load. Yeah Well staff
(38:14):
for Noel Bad Hustle Rule is the production of Waffle
Iron Entertainment, Range Media Partners, Observatory Audio, UP Media, and
I Heart Radio. Written and directed by Gwendolyn oxen Um,
hosted by me Hannah wading Um and is based on
the book Under the Lights and in the Dark, written
by Gwendolyn oxen Um. The executive producers are Justin Biskun
(38:35):
from Waffle Iron Entertainment, Bob Alligan from Range Media Partners,
and Sean Titan from I Heart Radio. Co written by
Ruth Hilton, Produced by Gwendolyn oxen Um, Ruth Hilton and
Jordana Glick Franszheim co produced by Jimmy Jelinek and Jared Goodstadt,
Edited by Carry Caulfield, Eric sound design and mixing by
Jeremiah's Immerman. Music by Jeff Peters and Bill mart Theme
(38:58):
song performed by a One La Flair. You'll find more
podcasts from iHeart Radio on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts. Boy Blop
To make it. To be great at anything, the traditional
ordinary route doesn't always work. Sometimes you have to go
out of bounds, seeking out a path that looks like
no one else's hustling, trusting your gut even when other
people tell you know. I'm Hannah Waddingham and this is
Hustle Rule, an audio docuseries featuring the untold stories of
(00:24):
women's soccer players around the world, based on the book
Under the Lights and in the Dark, written by Gwendolen Oxenham.
Like the story you're about to hear, I know what
it's like to be just outside your dream, to be
on the brink, to have to keep pushing and pushing.
In my own life, I did have to fight for
(00:46):
every step of my success. Before I got ted Lasso,
I had been hammering at the door of television for
a really, really long time, for like twenty five years.
I always got what I refer to as the also
ran part, but I could never land the main role.
Because I was in musical theater, a leading lady on
the West End stage. People treated me like, well, you're
(01:09):
mainly a singer, and I was like, no, no, no, no,
I'm not give me a chance. This is the story
of a relentless chase, a player's refusal to give up.
This episode is La Gringa, The Alley Long Story. Nobody
(01:41):
Here's Gwen our author. While writing my book, I was
interested in the players so close to their football dreams
who put in triple days to stay ready and still
don't get picked for the national team. Twenty three players
make the World Cup roster. What's it like to be player?
(02:02):
You watch your best friends make the team when they're
nineteen twenty years old. How does it feel to be
nearly thirty, still holding on, still hoping, even though that's
around the age most of your heroes start retiring. But
Ali still told herself one day I'll play in the Olympics.
(02:23):
I'll play in the World Cup. And to do that
to get there, she knew it would take something a
little different, something nobody else was doing. In this episode,
we head to the underground leagues in New York to
cutthroat games with high stakes, big crowds, and cash prizes,
where Ali Long plays against the men. This will be
(02:46):
her approving ground. The environment is something that I have
never experienced anywhere else in my life. The games were crazy, intense.
There's a lot of people, all thousands of people. There's
sometimes I like you could Burley played. They're all like
almost incited, feel like you gotta be pushing people around.
And especially when there's big tournaments like that you play
(03:07):
for ten thows, Like one day, there's music blasting. You
have people in the in the corner selling food and panadas,
rice and beans, beers, drinks, and then everyone's yelling screaming
every shot they take, every goal they score. Literally there's
(03:30):
a guy walking around taking bets with this little chart
and taking cash and kind of just being the bookie
on the spot. There's a lot of steak, whether it's
you know, a check, whether it's just playing for pride.
And the level and the speed of player that they
were playing at was insane. And these leagues there's a
lot of pro players. You see a lot of like
ex World Cup players, ex national team players, Colombian, Peruvian, Paraguayan.
(03:56):
You see all these players in these gyms playing because
they still love the game game. There's an atmosphere that
nobody wants to be, especially being a football and you
see things that you've never seen a wrong anywhere. I
would sit on the silo and I'm like I just
want to play so bad. In her gut, she knew
this was where she was supposed to be. She just
(04:16):
had to prove it. Can't she hang with the men.
It's a good question, and to answer it, you'd have
to know a little bit about how Ali ended up
here in the first place. Let's rewind to suburban Long Island,
late nineteen eighties. Ali has been playing against guys since
the very beginning. She started playing soccer when she was four,
(04:39):
on a team, and she was crazy. She was so
into it. It was a co ed league, and she
would go there and she would run over all the
little boys and score goals and then just jump up
and cheer. You could say it's genetic. Ali's mom, Barbara,
has been playing her whole life, and she passed her
love of the game on to Ali. My mom is
(05:02):
actually such a g She still plays pick up to
this day with guys. She's like the only girl. But um.
Growing up, she played in a women's league, so she
used to bring me to her games every weekend. We
used to go out and on the street in front
of our house and kick the ball back and forth
for hours and count how many times we could get
it back and forth, and it would get dark at
(05:24):
we'd still be playing because the street lights would come
on and I love that summer air. And we finally
my husband Chols and say come on in. You know,
we have to go in now, you know. And when
she was eleven years old, Ali made up her mind
she was going to play for the US women's national team.
Ever since I saw the nine win the World Cup,
(05:45):
I knew right then that's exactly what I wanted to do.
I didn't even think of another option. My mind was set.
I wanted to play for the U s wims actual team,
and I wanted to win a World Cup. There was
one national team player in particular who Ali really lee
looked up to. I love me and him growing up.
I wanted her to sign anything. I didn't care, and
(06:07):
one day she got her chance. Here's her dad, James,
Ali's grandfather, her biggest supporter, brought us tickets to a
national team game against Australia. And as a game came
to an end, I see my wife and a whizz Ali,
(06:28):
I don't know who's elliot. I go to my fall.
I wis all you don't know? So then everybody's like
five deep at the fence at the ground floor of
the stands because the little girls are coming around giving
autographs except for me. She was across the stadium from
where I was sitting, like where she chose to go
sign next, you know what? I thank god. I see
(06:51):
her on her hands and knees and she's crawled between
people's legs like five geep, I'm telling five next, you know.
And I see her climb over the fence. I'm like
what So then I shoot down and I'm behind her
and actually I had to uh push a few people
(07:12):
out of the way, and I see her now she's
running across the field. I literally hopped the fence. I
don't even know how this happened, and ran to where
she was and I was like, can you sign us?
And she signed it and I like hopped the fence
back over and my dad was like, you're out of
your mind, but good job you got her signature. She
is relentless. She perseveres in every avenue and everything she does,
(07:36):
and that's what makes all those champions champions. Her me
obsession is part of why she transferred from Penn State
University to the University of North Carolina. Chapel Hill a
legendary program for women's soccer North Carolina. For me was
where the best of the best play. That's where me
and Hamm went. You know, I wanted to be just
(07:57):
like her, do what she did and stepping on the
same field Mia did and being coached by the same
coach that coached me in hearing what he said to
her and he's talking to me about it. Here's head
coach antson Dorren's describing Ali. I mean she was sort
of a street fighter, and we certainly like that quality
in her. She is very good in possession, She sees
(08:18):
the field beautifully. Her decision making is exquisite. But the
ring that rules the mall is competitive fire and if
you want to have one ring to try to build
your game on, that's probably the most critical one. And
she had that in spades. The summer after her junior
year at U n C, Ali's longtime club coach invited
(08:41):
her to train with his men's semi pro team in
Long Island. And on the first day of practice, we're
playing like five five and it was five minutes or
two goals, So whoever was winning at the end of
five minutes or if you scored two goals. Then another
team comes on and so my team we didn't even
last the five minutes, Like right away the team scored
two goals. It was the third time that this happened.
(09:03):
We're running off the field and one of the guys
in my team was like, we keep losing, like made
a comment under his breath, like, oh, we keep losing.
And as I'm running past this guy to like go
to the sideline, He's like, because you have a girl
on your team, And I was like, are you kidding me?
Who is this kid? I literally hated him, I think
(09:23):
after that game, though my team won every game, like
I made sure of it because he made that comment.
So I appreciate him in inspiring me to like just
shut him up. The guy who enraged Ali Jose Baptista,
but most people call him Botti. She hated me after that,
(09:43):
I guess just just because she was on that team
and they lost so quick. I like blamed her for
it kind of, you know. I mean, I thought it
was also funny, but yes, I for sure meant it.
But they ended up doing well. But I'm like, wow,
she's really good. But despite the rough star, he broke
her down joke by joke play by play, So Botti
(10:06):
is like really funny, and so he would always make
these like little comments and I was trying not to
laugh at his jokes. As the summer went on and
the more we played with each other, I got to
know him off the field and like totally understand the
person he was on the field. I gave myself the
opportunity to get to know him, because before that there
was zero chance that I wanted anything to do with him.
(10:28):
But once I was cool with him, and I guess
like start to like him. I brought that up immediately.
I was like, are you serious, that was your comment,
your very first comment, and he just like thinks it's
so funny. He's like, I was obviously joking and I
said it as you're running by, so you heard me,
just mess with you. I just decided to give her
(10:50):
to give her banter just to see how she would
react to it, and yeah, she didn't take it lightly,
but I thought it was hysterically funny. Ali and Botti
start training to get They're outside of practice, hitting long balls,
talking smack, learning each other's tendencies. I've always been so
impressed with the confidence that he has many plays going
(11:11):
up to a p K. He's always a fifth shooter,
the one to kind of like solidify the wind, and
he just chip the keeper every single time. I think,
just always having fun with each other, joking with each
other is kind of like what was like the foundation
of our relationship. Also like his belief in me, his
support in me. It was unfamiliar from just a guy athlete.
(11:32):
They understood each other and played off of one another
on the field and off of it. Little by little,
they began introducing each other to their worlds. When Ali
left for her senior year at U n C, Botti
and his friends regularly made the ten hour drive to
see her play, unpacking this car out with as many
(11:52):
friends as I can. You know, I remember going to
see uncavers Duke and we got to the so cool,
like the rivalry, the tackling is extra, the cheering his extra.
Just to witness all of that, it was cool, especially
(12:13):
like my friends who didn't go to college, who got
to witness that. And after Ali takes Botti to her games,
Botti introduces her to the games that meant the most
to him, these underground football leagues with men from all
over the world. Football is a fast paced, smaller version
(12:34):
of soccer, usually five aside, played on a gym court
using a smaller, harder ball. It originated in the nineteen
thirties in Uruguay. Football means everything to my family. They're
immigrants from South America. My dad's Brazilian, my mom's Colombian,
so it runs in the blood. I started going to
(12:56):
these leagues to watch my dad and his friends play.
The league's have a rich history of fathers passing down
the game to their sons. Here are Bodsy and his
friends explaining the game's roots. It started as like a
Hispanic thing where families would come together and rent these
(13:17):
gyms out and play. And then they got so competitive
that these families started getting ringers and like giving them
money to help them play with their team to try
and win. And that's how he just kept growing and growing,
and the money just started getting better and better. My
mom would have me in the stroller, would be eating
in banadas, you know, on the sideline, and just hanging out.
(13:40):
My dad, being from Columbia, he came over here and
you know, back then there was no real professional league
in the US, and this was the only place to
play for these guys and there was just so many
good players. They were just insane. That's Mike Pelacio. He
played for the New York Red Bulls for two years
US and he's one of the guys who plays on
(14:02):
battist footsal team. So my dad would be going from
game to game, hustling, playing in these games where each
country had a league. You know, you have the Peruvian league.
They paid this amount. My dad would be on a
team there that would be a game at nine am
and Brent would and then at five o'clock he would
have a game in Flushing with the Columbian League. You know,
(14:22):
he's making five dollars a game. Thirty years ago he
made a good living doing this. My name is Mohammed
Mushriki from Flushing, Queens, New York born and raised. I've
played soccer for the national team of Afghanistan for about
(14:42):
four years and uh I've played soccer in underground leagues
actually since I was fourteen up until these days. There
are crowds you get, you know, wrapped around the field
that they put the pressure on you. You know. Then
we have Diego Boluto. He is Argentinian. Probably one of
my favorite people to be around. His Argentinian barbecues are
(15:07):
the best. But um, he's he just played in Gym's
his whole life. I'm from New York and just a
regular street boiler pretty much. You know a guy that
love soccer. You know. I've been playing soccer since I'm
three years old and and I've been doing it ever since.
My name is annas Vedo. I grew up in Maniji, Colombia.
(15:27):
I was nine years old when I got here. I
used to work at a hotel in the city now
in the housekeeping department. I quit my job just too
that it came myself to play in those leagues because
the money was really good. I call him the King
of underground leagues because he made a killing. He was sick.
The most I've got in the game half an hour game,
(15:48):
but I'm talking about fifteen minute halves. There was Allen,
along with another kid on the team, Jules Escobar, actually
went on to play with the U. S national football team.
When I first told Ali about it, obviously she had
no idea and she was like what she wanted to come?
She was like all about it. She was really excited
(16:10):
and then she came to my first game. I knew
how good Botty was. I knew how good his friends were,
but I didn't know how good the other players were
and how the other teams were. I'm in street clothes,
I am probably getting an impanada. I am enjoying my time.
(16:30):
I watched it in a way to kind of learn
the game as well. I would want to know how
did they just get out of that situation, or what
made them shoot the ball that way, or how did
they get free there? Movement off the ball on the
ball was so intriguing to me, So I loved it
kind of almost as like a student watching and a
fan watching, but of course almost dying to play. We
were scared to play her because you know, she's playing
(16:53):
at a high level and I we didn't want her
to get hurt. That's Alan, and here's Botti. It's not
like a normal soccer game in the sense where the
refs are going to call everything, you know, fouls a foul. Know,
in these leagues they let a little more go than usual,
so there's a lot of body contact. There's a lot
of pushing and shoving. So I was always scared for
(17:14):
something that happened to her or her to get her.
There's always a fight or about to be a fight
almost every single match that I watched up until that point.
So when they said I didn't want to get injured,
I understood in the sense I was like, Okay, I
see what you mean. So for the first couple of seasons,
(17:36):
Ali would just watched the games from the sidelines. She
graduates from YOU and C and then she starts playing
professionally for the Washington Spirit in two do intend. She
even got called up to play with the full US
national team. It did not go well. Second day of camp.
She tore her mc l I attempted to train like
(17:57):
I tried to pretend that I was fine, but I
just couldn't move at all in that moment. I was
obviously devastated. After that camp, I kind of had this
mindset of like, Okay, what do I need to, you know,
improve on? My mentality was like I have to be
so good that they literally couldn't ignore me. Four months
(18:18):
after camp, her knees better. She's in New York watching
Botti and his friends playing a four before FOOTBALLITO tournament
with a three thousand dollar cash prize, and she's more
hungry than ever. One of our good friends gets a
red card right away, and so they're down a player
and I'm just like I can go in, like hello,
(18:38):
first thing she says, like I have my stuff, and
they're like looking at me and they're like no, And
all of a sudden, the other team scores and the
right away I'm like I'm out. I'm getting myself. So
I like ran out to the car. I come back,
and I just felt like I knew that I needed
to play fast. I needed to be confident, and I
needed to go in and like almost like prove my
(19:00):
elf because the game happened so fast. The space is
so small, the ball small, and they're closing you down faster.
The first ball I get like, I make a pass goal.
I remember her going for her first tackle. I remember
clear because it's one of the things I was like
most worried about. And she actually won that tackle and
(19:20):
I was like, okay, okay, she can hang. Here's Alan.
So the guys started talking like talking bad about her,
like oh, you can't even play this, what are you
doing here? Like I'm scared to hit you, like you
feel bad for you? And she made them. Actually the
crowd went nuts. It was just so fun to be
(19:44):
on the court with them, and to be able to
score and like assist and win that game when they
were losing was one of the best feelings and just
they I still talked to them for it. Let me
tell you, Ali played the freaking game of her life.
That's the ag We be done. We made it to
the final. And there's so many kids, little kids, different ages,
(20:06):
you know, girls. He was following us all over the place,
obviously Ali, you know, because all the girls were like
so amazed. The little girls were like, oh my god,
how she played so good. The following weekend, I started
talking to my teammates and coaches and like, yo, let's
give Allie like five or ten minutes and here and there.
And then that's how it went until she became one
(20:27):
of us. You start hearing like whispers and like my
friends on other teams are like, is Alie playing with
you guys? I'm like, yeah, she's playing today. A lot
of times after the big game that day, a lot
of people leave. Everyone stayed to watch us play. And
I think it was more to watch her play, to
(20:49):
see how she would do. To see this girl gonna
play with the men, the whistle about to blow and
the other teams looking at your team and you're looking
at them and you're kind of just seeing, like who's
on the other team. Are they good? Are they not?
Like what's this game gonna be? Every time I'm on
the field, right away, it's like, okay, they have a
girl on their team. They're thinking that I'm going to
(21:11):
be nowhere near as good as them, without ever seeing
me play. It's almost like they will let me have
the ball first, they won't really like pressure me right away.
I'm like, oh, you're gonna give me space, let's go,
And then as soon as I start playing, they're like, okay,
they know that they have to play me as if
I'm a guy. I always loved it because it made
(21:33):
me play like it was the World Cup final. Every
single time I was on the field. Occasionally there'd be
someone who didn't want her out there. And it was
a playoff match, so the game was intense. Loser goes
home and we're playing like older guys. And I played
a one touch passed and he kind of just came
in right behind me like hit me a little bit late,
(21:55):
and I said something to him back, like are you
serious or what do you doing? And he like responded
in Spanish like go play with dolls, and actually didn't
know what dolls translation was in Spanish. All of a sudden,
the guys are like in his face and I'm like,
what do you say? What do you say? And right
away I think bati or someone said to me, he
(22:18):
told you go play with dolls. I was like, no,
he didn't, and I'm kidding me. Um, but yeah, so
after that, I was like, oh, I'm gonna like, I
have to just like score as many goals as possible. Um.
We won, and I don't know if I scored that many,
but I scored a couple and I think I said like,
you go play with dolls. At the end, I didn't
even know how to pronounce the word dolls. But guys
(22:38):
like that were the exception. For the most part, she
won everybody over. Every time she touched the ball was like,
oh she made it a past. It was like oh um.
And then as as time went on, and all you
hear is la gringa, la gringa, which means like a
little white girl, a white girl, you know, a blonde girl.
Like I'll get the ball and I'll make up the
(22:58):
most basic past. I think initially they're like kind of
whistling like, oh, she completed her past a condescending whistle
in away um, but also like cheering for me too.
It's a weird it's a weird feeling um. And then
once they could tell that I can play, it was
like we want to watch her play this whole time,
like put her in, keep her in um. Any time
(23:20):
I did anything, they would cheer, clap, yell at me
um in Spanish. It definitely started as kind of like like, oh,
good for her, you know, she's playing cool. Let's cheer
for the girl. And then as I earned the respect
or as the game played on, then it was more
(23:41):
of like, okay, like we want to watch her play.
There's been times where the gym is packed and we're down,
we go down early, and then ADDIE's scoring a goal here,
two goals here, three goals here, and the gym was
going crazy, and then they're making fun of the other
(24:01):
team because of girls scoring on them. She would put
on magic. She likes fit footwork and all of that,
and she should put on the show. Her dream, of course,
is still to make the national team. After the Washington Spirit,
she plays for New Jersey Sky Blue. Then for Paris
Saint German, but she always comes back here to these
(24:21):
gyms across Queens. These games are what she thinks will
get her there. But two thousand and eleven passes without
getting called up. In two thousand and twelve, she didn't
get called up. In two thousand and thirteen, she's drafted
to the Portland Thorns, where she will play with some
of the best players in the world, Christine Sinclair, Alex Morgan,
(24:44):
Tobin Heath. She plays more minutes than any other player
on the team and they win the championship. Still she
does not get called up. All the football guys pay attention.
They call her or text when she scores, when she wins,
when she loses. To me, she's she's like a sister.
(25:06):
I call her sister. I follow all her games. You know,
after the game, you know, sister, what an amazing game
you did? You know, amazing you play? Sick, keep it up,
it is going to come. That's diego. I've seen how
much work she put on to be on the Nation
Room team, and I remember her getting to a point
of being, you know, frustrating, because she'd be like, what
(25:28):
else do I gotta do? I used to tell her.
I was like, listen, it's gonna come no matter what.
You know, It's just a matter of time. And then
the U S women's national team gets a new coach
and in May two and fourteen, after years of waiting,
Ali gets an invitation to the national team training camp
(25:48):
for long ass years. This time, she doesn't get injured,
she plays well in the first camp, and she gets
called into another. She is in the running for a
World Cup roster spot. At the end of the January camp,
just a few months away from the World Cup, Ali
(26:11):
and head coach Jellalis have a meeting. She sat me
down and she was like, you're not in my plans
for this World Cup. It takes experience to win these things,
people that have been in these situations under pressure. And
that was her deciding factor in that moment. And so
the camp was in l A. I flew home to
New York. I think I cried the entire flight. I
(26:33):
think the person next to me felt so bad for me.
I'm pretty sure they handed me tissues midflight. It was
horrible to know that I'm so close. That was my dream.
It only happens every four years. The US woman's side
went on to win the World Cup. Ali watches from
home as her friends become champions. It was hard and
(27:00):
at the same time like I want nothing but success
for them and I want them to be the best.
So it was a bittersweet balance for sure. I remember
when she was trying to figure out a way to
get some attention to make the US full national team.
We would talk all the time. That's hands in durance again.
Ali's coach at U n C, and she kept saying,
you know, and what do I need to do? What
(27:21):
do I need to do? What do I need to do?
I finally said, well, Ali, let me give you the
bottom line. If you score goals and create goals, it's undeniable.
You're gonna make it the next season playing in the NWSL,
Ali has an even bigger chip on her shoulder. When
you go to the World Cup, it's a twenty three
man roster. When you go to the Olympics for the
(27:43):
next year, it's an a te man roster. And so
like the chances of me making if I didn't make
the World Cup team at twenty three players, they just wanted,
why are you going to change much to an a
tea man roster? Um? You know, everyone told me basically
like be impossible and so, but I kind of like that,
(28:05):
Like I enjoyed them telling me that there's no chance.
That season, she's named the team's most valuable player, and
as a defensive midfielder, a position that doesn't typically score
that much, she is the NWSL's second leading goal scorer,
but again she doesn't get called in. In January of
(28:26):
two thou and sixteen, there's a national team residency camp
and of the players invited, there are ten new faces.
Ali isn't one of them. It was one of the
hardest things to kind of feel and deal with at
that time. That's when she got stronger, she got quicker,
(28:52):
she got fitter, and I feel like that's when she
became an all around player, the best, so the best.
I was literally going to make this team or I
was going to die trying. She keeps training, keeps putting
in the double and triple days just in case, and
(29:15):
as the next NWSL preseason begins, she's still playing like
an m v P. Even among international stars like Almondine
Henri and Lindsey Horan. I felt the best, I've ever felt,
the fittest, strongest, just on fire, you know, my speed
of play was the best it's ever been. And before
(29:37):
we even played our first game, I get an email
from the USIM's national team saying that I was invited
into the next camp. We're driving to a team bonding
experience with the Portland Thorns and I'm in the back
of the van with Tobin and I just like show
her my phone and she was freaking out, but silently
(29:57):
freaking out because she didn't want everyone in the bus
to be like what happened. And I literally like cried
when I got it. And I couldn't believe it, but
I could because like I felt like I knew this
was going to happen. I knew that I that like,
once I got my chance, that I was gonna absolutely
make the most of it. On April six, the United
States plays Columbia in a friendly and Ali starts in
(30:20):
the center of the midfield. This game, everything is on
the line. This is her chance to prove she belongs
in the stands. Ali's parents and Botty, Diego and Alan
from the NYC footsal Leagues make up the Ali Fan Club.
I remember it like yesterday, to be honest, it's freezing.
(30:42):
I'm talking about freezing cold. Alie's like on the brink
of making the team, not making the team. Then in
the thirty second minute, it's Ali's first international goal and
there's a second goal not at all maxit to us,
(31:04):
it's her fust internet show goal gives the U s
A a two to nothing lead. Yeah, so if it's
start so long as the USA, but she's not done yet.
Second goal. That when she scored one goal, we were
(31:25):
like yes, And then she scored another, we were like,
she made it. That was like the best game I've
ever sat through with her because she did so well
and we knew that that was going to be her
beginning on the team. But we went in saying we're
throwing beer, we're throwing water, we're jumping, we're hugging, we're yelling,
you name it, we were doing it. I think that
(31:49):
game she put herself on that roster and she was
being there and being able to witness that all the
hard work it in, all those days you were crying,
all those days you didn't want to wake up, all
the days you didn't want to run in the snow,
train in the rain, Just like all those days was
(32:10):
worth it. And you feel that every single player in
those gyms. I have so much gratitude for all of them,
even though they made it extremely difficult. They gave me
um no room to mess up. They held me to
(32:31):
the highest standard, and sometimes I hated them, but at
the end of the day, it made me better. After
two more friendlies, Jill l S tells everyone she'll give
them a call to let them know who will be
going to the Olympics. When I saw her name on
my phone, I wasn't nervous, but I felt like I
(32:55):
did everything I can and at this point her decisions
may it so I just have to accept it. And
you know, she said, congratulations, you made the Olympic roster,
and she's like, I'm so proud of you. You earned it.
And I started to cry, like on the phone. I
was like tearing, and she was like, she started like
(33:15):
giggling a little because it's I guess, like when I
play soccer, I'm so competitive and so tears aren't like
the first thing you would think of when you think
of me in a sense, So you know, I started
tearing and she like knew and I guess in that
moment how much that meant to me and bought to
next to me just like gave me hug, and he
was like, I'm so proud of you, Like, now, let's winning.
(33:38):
I was crying tears of happiness. And when the football
guys found out she was going to the steen Rio
de Janeiro Olympics, they were so proud, so happy. You know,
they're posting in anywhere on all their social media, like
they're so outwardly proud and supportive of me and my success.
(34:00):
And they always joke with me. It's like because I
played with them, that's why I am where I am.
And now, at age twenty nine, Ali is a starter
in her first major national team game at the Rio Olympics.
Her family is there to watch. You can't believe that's
where you are, you know, in Brazil and she was
(34:22):
starting on the Olympic team. This girl has worked her
ass off and he made me cry. Here he is
coming down my eyes, saying down this is what she's
worked her as flor entire life and it's got the fruition.
(34:42):
And against France, Ali is named player of the game.
The US ends up losing to Sweden in the quarterfinals,
but Ali's dream, the one she's had since she was
eleven isn't over yet. She still wants to win a
World Cup, and this time in nineteen she did all
(35:07):
the work, all the years of training. It finally paid
off Frali and for Betty. I mean, I basically lived
my dream through Ali, with her making the squad that
was one dream checked off, and then playing in the
(35:28):
World Cup that was another dream checked off, and then
actually winning the World Cup. That is crazy to say
Ali won the World Cup. I feel like I won
the World Cup when I looked back at what my
goals were and where I started and the path that
(35:50):
I took in almost what was set forth for me
to get me to where I am today. I think
that playing in these leagues, the relationship with Botty, all
of that essentially changed my life for the better and
kind of instilled this passion, this joy, this sense of
this culture that like I never really knew existed and
(36:12):
allowing me to play in these leads with them and
everyone wanted me to make the national team, goalie Olympics,
win a World Cup that was almost the guy's dream
as much as it was my dream. And so you know,
their impact, their friendship, their support has made me the
player am today. These games made her tough. These games
(36:36):
further honed that quality her parents picked up on back
when she was ten, Her refusal to say no, her
competitive fire. Ali long is relentless, and seeing the hard
scrabble experiences of these guys, some who got a chance,
some who did not, made her fight all the more
for her own. Yet, making the national team is not
(36:58):
really what this story is about out because no matter
how far you do or do not get, a professional
sports career always eventually ends. But as Italian writer Cristiano
Calvina once told Gwen, football will give you much more
than you could ever give it. We're all trying to
(37:19):
find our place, to find our people. That may be
the whole point of everything, and that's what Ali and
so many others found thanks to this beautiful game. Yes
until like I'm literally carried off the field and I
physically cannot move, I'm going to play forever. Join us
(37:43):
for the next episode The mother Load. Yeah Well staff
(38:14):
for Noel Bad Hustle Rule is the production of Waffle
Iron Entertainment, Range Media Partners, Observatory Audio, UP Media, and
I Heart Radio. Written and directed by Gwendolyn oxen Um,
hosted by me Hannah wading Um and is based on
the book Under the Lights and in the Dark, written
by Gwendolyn oxen Um. The executive producers are Justin Biskun
(38:35):
from Waffle Iron Entertainment, Bob Alligan from Range Media Partners,
and Sean Titan from I Heart Radio. Co written by
Ruth Hilton, Produced by Gwendolyn oxen Um, Ruth Hilton and
Jordana Glick Franszheim co produced by Jimmy Jelinek and Jared Goodstadt,
Edited by Carry Caulfield, Eric sound design and mixing by
Jeremiah's Immerman. Music by Jeff Peters and Bill mart Theme
(38:58):
song performed by a One La Flair. You'll find more
podcasts from iHeart Radio on the iHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts. Boy Blop
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