Angel City FC Press Conference: 08.01.24 | Coach Becki Tweed

yeah I think it's something that we've talked about over the last couple of weeks is like removing pressure um I think you know when I did a deep dive on this team and we've talked about it a lot everybody strives for Perfection and everybody as an elite athlete wants to be perfect every single day that's why they are where they are and I think stripping that back a little bit and just giving them the freedom and and the confidence to be able to make mistakes we've talked about what every single person is good at and what we need from them to contribute to the team for us to be good and I think just giving them that kind of you know that that space to express themselves um and take the pressure off I think going into the pens we knew that it was a chance for us to gain experience like we always want to win and we always want to beat rival teams but there was no pressure on us it's something that we do every single day I think you could see that like we have taken pens every day for the last three weeks and you know sometimes we put something on it and and we play for champ like it's funny Sid Sid said at the end we all get a Champions League point because we always run a table every every day with something competitive but yeah I've just asked them to really enjoy themselves enjoy the game enjoy each other um enjoy the struggle I think the first 20 minutes was a struggle but we put ourselves through that and we had to enjoy it instead of get stressed out by it I think in past weeks we've got stressed out by struggle so finding ways to enjoy struggle finding ways to enjoy winning finding ways to enjoy each other and just be the best versions of ourselves has been the main focus for the last couple of weeks thanks over to you no you're good yeah I think obviously that the game is nil nil right and it's a first game back for a long time and I think it's managing everything it's managing the physical piece it's managing the mental piece I knew for a fact that she was going to take a pen um that's something she's done her whole career in high pressured situation so I think just balancing it out and it kind of worked out with with kjo as well they were both on minute restrictions coming in off their first game so you know something that you don't see very often but something that was important for the team is that we just shared that load in that last 20 minutes once Messiah kind of started to feel a cramp a little bit so I think I have to give the credit to obviously KY Johnson as well I think to come in and come out is actually really difficult and sometimes hard to understand but I explained it to her um and she is on minute restrictions and she's returning also from an injury so um something that you don't see often and something that was a little bit out of the ordinary but in the moment felt like it was the best decision to split that between the quality of nines that we do have for sure does that yeah I think we spoke about the summer cup like we said at the start the summer cup is valuable like to win um Winning is Everything and winning is so important to players to staff to confidence to being able to continue to grow so you know the day what we talked about the objectives on the slide the first thing was win um I think every Club is probably saying the same you you want to set out to win you obviously have to find the balance of giving players minutes um building relationships I think this is probably the first time that we've been able to play consistent team as well um and we have to use this kind of window to our advantage we have a lot of players still here and it means we can continue to grow and build um so you know again everyone is in this environment because they strive to win um and it doesn't matter what you win sometimes you've just got to win and I think you know finding this winning mentality and spirit and the dog in this team um we have to continue to bring out of them but I think you see right when they're confident and they're enjoying it and they're having fun it just speaks volumes to to how much they can do together as a group yeah I spoke to her and I said to Alissa and Kennedy like for me these are moments in Alysa and Kennedy's career that are going to be in the long run they going to happen to them over and over again and I hope it happens to them in really big environments whether it be NW championships whether it be World Cup finals like I hope this is something that they both continue to grow on they both take them in practice every day and they're both confident in it so I always say it like the end of sell doesn't care about how old you are professional sports doesn't care about how old you are cares about how much you feel that you can you can do it and how confident you are and all five of our penalty takers tonight stepped up and I think credit to Alyssa as well stepped up in a in an environment where you know she's creating opportunities for herself and she's she's playing really well and that penalty was really big for her to get the ball ball in the back of the net she's the she had none I was so shocked she was just ready I mean she's been ready now and it's just been finding the right moment for her for the team um for everybody to get to get her on the field and and I asked her if she was ready and she she didn't even Flinch so I think she's been ready for this moment for a while I think you know she didn't know when it was going to come I think that's sometimes really hard you can't predict when it's going to happen um but I think this was a night for it I think you know this this game created a lot of atmosphere it created a great environment um and I think to be able to get on the field for her and take a penalty as well is something that's huge um for her but also for this club and this team moving forward getting some confidence for for people a little Curry perance yeah I think what's really impressive about Curry is she just takes everything in her stride Center back she's played left back just the versatility to play at the back I do think that the support she gets from this team um and just how I don't even know the right word like she always strives for more like she can never say yeah I had a good game today she's always like yeah it was okay um and I think that mindset is going to get her a long way I think that I hope that she takes this and grows in confidence with it um but I think when you look at the people that she has surrounding her with Sarah with Meg with jazz all players that have played in this league and been put in similar situations to her they've all had rookie Seasons they've all had uh moments that have you know been high pressure and they've really helped guide her through it and I think she's really finding her feet here in this team and um yeah I think our future is really really bright right thank you thank you guys well I think it was a lot of emotion um so many ups and downs over the last two years definitely moments where I didn't think I'd be able to make it um and I think sometimes as athletes wherever we are we're looking for the next the next thing the next medal and I was just trying so hard this week to be present and know that it was really it was pretty symbolic like I just ran on the field for the last five minutes but it was me making it and it was a lot of determination and patience that was required for me to just run on the field tonight and I really see it as the beginning of the next part of my journey battle moreal I mean I think both I would give it 50 and 50 and it was both it was really hard on both sides because I think there was nothing that could have happened that would have made me stop trying or Stop Believing so like that part was easy for me but it was really hard to understand like why this was happening and what it was in my life and mentally I really took the the perspective of like why is this happening what's the gift what is the lesson what's the opportunity here and over the last two years like I transformed my life like I moved home I settled I figured out who I was and like I never thought I was going to have like the existential athlete retirement crisis I never thought I was but I kind of did being out of the game two years and you just I've known my whole life myself as this excellent athlete that's what I am and it's just like how do I find my value when I can't do the thing I'm good at um and and in a lot of ways I found a lot of peace and I hope now when I am returning to the pitch I hope that I can keep that peace and not return as the same person that I was but return a little bit more grounded and a little bit more sturdy yeah so I was just telling myself like be present be present I've been going to the farmers market every Sunday when I go to the farmers market I tell myself like okay shop with like your intuition like taste things and smell things and like look people in the eye you know because so much of our life is like digital and monotonous and so I was like I'm going to smell the grass and I'm going to hear the crowd CU you like never hear the crowd um but truth to be told it was very overwhelming and I was just like I was smiling like ear to ear but like I don't know what I was feeling or what was happening it was just sort of like a roar of emotions that like maybe someday I'll be able to process hi can you talk a bit about the journey with your teammates obviously you did a lot of feeling covering training on your own what it is to back with the team and what it's been like to interact with yeah I think one of the biggest surprises was how much I missed being in a team environment um I always thought when I was playing like that this professional athlete life really wasn't for me like living in a hotel communal living you know eating what you're told like it wasn't like my healthy natural state and then when I was out of it I really missed having that support system and I think the thing that I love so much about a team and like especially like the Women's Soccer World world is just like how authentic these women are right like the banter the laughs the jokes like you know sometimes the sport itself is so intense but like the way we get through it collectively is always like what we call gal culture I think you're familiar it's like being unashamed at like your struggle and being able to share that and relate to that and I don't think there's a lot of spaces that women have that opportunity and I'm very very excited to be back in the locker room and this team has been so supportive like it feels like the girls that have been there from the beginning have like seen so much and a lot of our teams new but the new players are very young and so it was like you know they were watching 2015 World Cup as like little kids you know and now they're like oh my God you're on our team and I'm like yeah this is crazy I'm literally double your age um but there's like a huge opportunity to like mentor and like pass the torch to the Next Generation it's really special all right uh we can only take one more question and then we got to go to there and then we'll come um well this is going to sound cuckoo but that's just me I guess um I was thinking about how I learned at some point um about how athletes are vessels and how we have this idea of like turning humans into Idols but really um when you think of like the best player in the world you think about Lionel Messi like he's a vessel in everyone believes in him and they Channel their energy and he just he just sort of transmits that and I think it's a really important thing that I've learned about sports because it kind of takes the pressure off you like I so I I when I entered that moment I was like remember that you're a vessel and like I was thinking about the fact that in this Stadium like every person like even the San Diego fans were like cheering for me in a way you know and I was like just be a vessel you know um but then yeah it was a little it was a little overwhelming I like I think I'm going to go to bed ton I me like really I played like 3 minutes and then took a penalty like this is just like a lot all uh steep thanks um you talked about how it felt a little symbolic like you just said three minutes in a penalty but that penalty did not look symbolic it looked quite sharp are notorious for being very you know a mental gay I'm just wondering for you in particular does sinking that kind of help with the whole like all right I'm back like stop asking about the KN we're gonna play we're gonna go forward I mean yes and no I think there's a couple of things um I feel really good I feel like I have my center of gravity I know exactly who I am I mean in training like the couple of moments that I've been in like 11s in my team training it literally feels like riding a bike like I know exactly the kind of player that I am how I like the ball I can communicate to my Midfield and my Defender like this this is how you find me like this is not how you find the other fours but this is like how I play and this is how I succeed so like in that regard I just I feel like myself and I think sharpness comes and I think I'm in a unique situation where I don't feel a lot of pressure because it's just taking me so long to be able to run on the field I think there's a lot of Grace now um but like with the penalty I actually think I actually think it was like probably the first time that the larger world has seen that I have my center of gravity and I have like like my footing and um I am the same player that I was hopefully a little better thank you last question goes to Jackie he's getting married tomorrow so we can forgive him yeah that must be his bachelor's yeah it got to be yeah his best jaie about Journey so many L learn just all yeah I think that a lot of it is about peace and like the Detachment of the idea that you have value because of what your output is right um I don't know if you're familiar but I'm an anagram 3 and like three is like generally a person that thinks that their value in the world is like what they contribute and they look for EXT internal validation because of their like childhood patterns right so I think over the last few years I've just done a lot of learning and I think about like my inner wisdom and my inner self and my like inherent value that comes from that and I think that's really what's provided me a lot of joy and I think it's it's like before I had happiness and now I have like an enduring joy that I've been able to find um that I can find like sitting on my couch doing nothing and I think hopefully it allows me to be my best my best version of myself as a player because I definitely feel like I've um like opened up a part of myself that I didn't know before that I really like and so hopefully there's an element of Kristen on the field that gets opened up and awakened and all of you can um enjoy that as well all right thank you very much thanks everybody