NEW YORK : United States defender Naomi Girma completes her meteoric rise from national team debutant to the Women’s World Cup stage next month and many are predicting she will be a key player for the four-times champions for many years.
The 23-year-old centre back first played for the senior U.S. team last year and quickly settled in to earn a place in Vlatko Andonovski’s World Cup squad.
“She’s threading balls down the middle of the field, skipping, bypassing the midfielders, playing it into the forwards’ feet,” retired two-time World Cup winner Carli Lloyd told Reuters.
“She’s playing well ahead of her time for the little experience she’s had. It’s really impressive,” added Lloyd who is now a Fox Sports analyst.
Girma has overcome problems on her journey to soccer’s biggest stage, forced to withdraw due to injury from her first senior call-up in 2019 and suffering a serious knee problem in 2020.
“For me it feels like a lot of hard work coming together,” she told Reuters.
“There was like a lot of work that went behind the scenes, because I went out injured and not playing… it was really gratifying and rewarding to feel like it was paying off and putting me in a better position.”
Girma will be particularly crucial for the U.S. after veteran Becky Sauerbrunn, long-time bedrock of the defence, announced last week she would miss the World Cup due to injury.
“Her potential is one of the highest bars of potential I’ve seen in a person in a long time,” said Briana Scurry, the goalkeeper in the United States’ 1999 World Cup-winning team.
Scurry, the host of the “Counterattack” podcast, told Reuters it is “almost blinding how quickly” Girma has improved and believes the Stanford graduate is a future team captain.
“She can read the play really well so she knows where to be in advance. And that’s not something that a younger player normally possesses,” said the twice Olympic gold medallist.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if she were a captain at one point in time.”
Girma is also keenly aware of her potential to inspire the next generation, as the daughter of Ethiopian immigrants whose father instilled in her a passion for the game and started a local soccer program where she and her brother could play.
“When I was younger, seeing someone who had a similar background as me, looked like me in any high position – it didn’t even have to be soccer-specific – competing at a high level was always so inspiring,” she said.
“I’m hoping that kids can see me and get that similar feeling and that same excitement.”
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