So how do you stop a clique from destroying a team? As Dr. Fieldstone explains to Crimm: give them a common enemy. Suddenly, the divisions inside the locker room matter less, and the team can unite against something bigger than itself. Perhaps the best example of this comes from one of the most successful locker rooms in women\u2019s soccer history.<\/p>\n
The U.S. teams that won back-to-back World Cup titles in 2015 and 2019 were full of enormous personalities, yet they found something more powerful than their competing celebrity. They got angry.<\/p>\n
The 2015 World Cup victory was followed by one of the most consequential collective fights in the history of women\u2019s sports. The players turned their attention toward U.S. Soccer and what they viewed as systemic inequality in pay, travel, playing conditions and treatment.<\/p>\n
In March 2016, Lloyd, Solo, Alex Morgan, Becky Sauerbrunn and Megan Rapinoe filed an Equal Employment Opportunity Commission\u00a0complaint alleging wage discrimination against U.S. Soccer.<\/a><\/p>\n \n Becky Sauerbrunn, Crystal Dunn and Sam Mewis were three members of the group that secured a collective bargaining agreement, signifying equal pay between the U.S. men\u2019s and women\u2019s teams in 2022. (Tim Nwachukwu\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n Sauerbrunn explained at the time that the entire team had agreed to the complaint. The five players had been elected by their teammates to represent them in collective bargaining and therefore became the names attached to the filing.<\/p>\n Players with different personalities, ideologies and levels of fame suddenly had a shared objective: equal pay. The fight was bigger than the cliques.<\/p>\n As the battle extended into the next generation, so did the collective nature of the team.<\/p>\n By the 2019 World Cup, Solo was no longer in goal, but many players from the 2015 squad remained. The fight with U.S. Soccer had escalated dramatically, with 28 USWNT players filing a gender-discrimination lawsuit just months before the tournament that they eventually won.<\/p>\n The U.S. women\u2019s national team is hardly the only team to discover that getting everyone pulling in the same direction is easier said than done; but done right it can be effective.<\/p>\n Arsenal and England captain Leah Williamson served as an authenticity consultant for \u201cTed Lasso\u2019s\u201d fourth season, answering writers\u2019 questions about women\u2019s football throughout production. We can\u2019t say for certain which parts of the show she directly advised on. However, Williamson experienced both\u00a0a club team that overcame reported locker room rifts<\/a>\u00a0when Arsenal won the UEFA Champions League and a national team that had plenty of outside noise heading into the 2025 European Championship.<\/p>\n \n Arsenal and England captain Leah Williamson knows what it\u2019s like to navigate cliques. (Justin Setterfield\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n Ahead of the 2025 Euros, England goalkeeper Mary Earps abruptly retired from international football and defender Millie Bright withdrew from selection due to mental and physical burnout. Neither was necessarily in coach Sarina Wiegman\u2019s starting line-up plans despite their successful legacy with the team. When giant personalities exit the locker room, it shakes up the dynamics. Still, the team found a way to overcome early tournament struggles to win a second European title. Wiegman\u2019s explanation for the success: \u201cB****** get s*** done.\u201d<\/a><\/p>\n For the U.S., it was fighting for equal pay. For the Lionesses, it was silencing the doubters. For AFC Richmond women, it was trivia and a good old-fashioned pub fight against a group of misogynistic hecklers at the Crown & Anchor.<\/p>\n Because sometimes it\u2019s not about being friends. It\u2019s about getting s*** done.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Spoiler alert: This article contains spoilers for this week\u2019s episode of Ted Lasso Apple TV\u2019s favorite soccer coach,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":873271,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[440],"tags":[49,48,569,8081,561,82,575,67875,1418,56974],"class_list":["post-873270","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-soccer","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-culture","tag-nwsl","tag-soccer","tag-sports","tag-sports-business","tag-us-womens-national-team","tag-womens-soccer","tag-womens-super-league"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873270","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=873270"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/873270\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/873271"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=873270"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=873270"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=873270"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/08\/GettyImages-1422618297-scaled.jpg\")
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