Former USWNT star Briana Scurry has pointed criticism of Vlatko Andonovski’s World Cup failure

SYDNEY, Australia — As Briana Scurry watched U.S. women’s soccer team manager Vlatko Andonovski and general manager Kate Markgraf depart in recent days, she wasn’t surprised. And she wasn’t complaining, either.

“As soon as the whistle was blown in the game against Sweden, I figured the house was going to be cleaned,” the legendary former goalkeeper told The Inquirer in an interview as she and thousands of other Americans in town got ready for the World Cup final.

“Vlatko had two bites at the apple and didn’t get it done,” she said, referring to Andonovski’s teams not winning this World Cup or the 2021 Olympics. “And a lot of people might say, ‘Well, that’s ruthless,’ but I think it’s just how we organize and how we work with the women’s team. The standard, the bar, is so incredibly high, and he obviously wasn’t up to the task.”

She made a point of saying that she wasn’t criticizing his character, just his coaching. And she knew that her biggest criticism of him was one that goes against the grain of a lot of conventional wisdom out there.

“I like Vlatko. I’m a fan of him, personally,” Scurry said. “But I always questioned his use of young players as starters in meaningful roles in big games. Five, six, young players starting. If you go back and you look at the success of the U.S. women’s national team in tournaments over the many decades, it’s always experience-heavy [players] that have starting roles.”

If you find it surprising she’d say that, you were warned.

» READ MORE: Spain wins the women’s World Cup and arrives as a women’s soccer superpower

“The younger players do come in and they play a role, but they don’t carry the majority of the burden of winning a game,” Scurry continued. “And that burden is really heavy for a first-time player coming in and not even understanding what this is like. … As much as I wanted them to persevere, I’m not surprised that they ended up losing early on.”

She argued, too, that she wasn’t happy with what she called “the way we do the transfer between a player who just came in versus players who’ve been in before” during Andonovski’s tenure.

“You can have your younger players, but you just have to understand that if you want to do well, you might not want to do [it] too heavy on the younger players,” Scurry said. “I have no problem with the younger players. They deserve a chance, they should be expected to be in there. But they should not be tasked with carrying the load, because it’s too much.”

And in some of her strongest criticism, she said: “That’s why we win so much, because we have an understanding [that] there’s actually, like, a formula about it. And he broke the formula.”

The good news, she believes, is that “the table is set for success again” thanks to the experience gained by this U.S. squad’s raft of young players will pay off.

» READ MORE: Kate Markgraf stepping down as GM of U.S. women’s national team

As for Markgraf’s departure, Scurry was more hesitant to go in hard on her longtime former teammate. But she wasn’t surprised that Markgraf left, with U.S. Soccer’s official word saying Markgraf left on her own with her contract expiring.

“Apparently there’s going to be a reorganization of hierarchy at the U.S. Soccer Federation,” she said. “And we’ll we’ll have to see how that goes. But, I mean, it’s a hard job. I’m not surprised she had the mindset of resigning either way.”

It’s undoubtedly easier to criticize from the sideline, or from a stage in front of cameras. Scurry was in town for a two-day women’s soccer convention run by FIFA, and she has done TV work for CBS recently.

If U.S. Soccer wanted to hire Scurry to a job in the new era, would she say yes?

“I would definitely consider it,” she said.

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