Christen Press Asks: Why Was Alex Morgan Left Off Olympic Roster

Injured U.S. star Press says U.S. coach Emma Hayes never gave a specific reason for Morgan’s omission

San Diego Wave FC forward Alex Morgan in an NWSL game on June 28 / Julia Kapros-USA TODAY Sports

When former Cal standout Alex Morgan was left off the U.S. Olympic soccer roster, media members jumped in to explain why Morgan might have been left off the 18-player squad.  But Christen Press, a U.S. soccer star who is nearing a return after being sidelined two years with a knee injury, wants the person who made the decision to tell us exactly why Morgan, a long-time U.S. Women’s National Team member with 123 international goals, was not included.

U.S. coach Emma Hayes, who announced the Olympic roster that did not include Morgan, never gave specific reasons why Morgan will not be part of the American team in Paris for the Summer Games. Morgan was not even named one of the four alternates.

Hayes provided a general explanation of how she went about choosing the 18 players, suggesting she was going with a younger and more versatile group. You can understand why she did not want to point out the specific flaws in Morgan’s game that led to her omission, because that might have sounded harsh. Coaches typically will discuss only the players on the team and are reluctant to explain why other players are not.

Still, it would have been illuminating to hear Hayes’ reasons for not including Morgan, who had been part of the 23-player USWNT roster in previous games this year and was a starter in most of them. Morgan, who turned 35 last week, was considered a borderline case to make the Olympic roster, with about half the experts expecting her to make the Olympic roster.

It was assumed Morgan’s omission was due to her age, her lack of versatility (she is a No. 9 striker only), an April ankle injury that sidelined her for a month and her scoring slump (she has not a scored a goal in any of her 10 NWSL games this year and scored only two goals, including one on a penalty, for the U.S. team this year).

But Press wanted to hear from Hayes, as Press explained in a discussion with friend Tobin Heath on the RE-CAP Show:

Here is what the 35-year-old Press said in response to a listener’s question, according to Goal.com:

“My first reaction was a little sad because it did feel like the end of an era, where Alex represented this entire movement that our generation was a part of. Usually, in tournaments that I’ve been in, there has been a very veteran player – maybe even older than Alex at 35

“From a footballing standpoint, I think I really wanted a clear reason why. We talked about this, and maybe we got one, but I think Emma gave like the most media-trained answer ever.

“She just kept saying, ‘Well, I picked other players and other players are awesome,’ and it’s like, ‘That’s true, but why did you not select her?’ I wanted to hear why. And if the reason was form, like, ‘My other players are scoring and Alex is not,’ then that’s the reason.

So I felt like we just kind of got left hanging and we can all just assume it’s because of club form, and she’s been hanging onto injury, or maybe [Hayes] didn’t value having someone on the roster that had won [the Olympics] before as much as she valued someone that she really felt like she could sub in and make a difference in a game. But I was just left being like, ‘Well, what did that phone call [to Morgan from Hayes] sound like? What was the real reason?’”

Learning Hayes’ thinking in her decision to omit Morgan, probably the most famous active American soccer player, would answer a lot of questions that remain unanswered, leading to media speculation.

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