U.S. women’s national team forward Sophia Smith said she can learn a thing or two from German striker Alexandra Popp, her counterpart in two upcoming friendlies.
The USWNT will take on Germany in its final two matches of 2022, the first of which will take place Thursday at DRV PNK Stadium in Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., with the second on Sunday at Red Bull Arena in Harrison, N.J.
The Euro 2022 runners-up will be led by Popp, who was co-leading scorer at the summer tournament with six goals before unfortunately being forced to miss Germany’s defeat to England in the final with an injury.
Coming off a season in which she was named NWSL MVP and scored in the final to help the Portland Thorns with the league title, Smith said she still has much to learn and Popp can be a model for her.
“Popp obviously is an incredible player,” Smith told the media on Wednesday. “Honestly, her movement in the box, how she gets on the end of crosses is something that I need to work on in my game.
“I watched her [at Euro 2022]. She’s very very good at it. So there’s stuff to learn there. But honestly, all the players on this team are great players and it’s going to be a good test for us for sure.”
After losing back-to-back games last month to England and Spain, Smith said she and her teammates are eager to get a result against Germany — though she stressed that putting in a strong performance was still the most important thing.
“We all have a hunger to get the result that we want and at the same time, we know that there are things we need to work on in these games that we didn’t do well enough in the last few games,” Smith said. “So not putting all the focus on the outcome, I think focusing for the most part on how we can grow from the last few games, how fix the things that we want to fix. I think if we do all those things, if we put together the pieces and do the little things right, we will get the outcome that we want.”
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