At 33 years old, Alexandra Popp She will wear the German national team shirt for the last time on Monday in Duisburg, the very city where she made her Women’s Bundesliga debut, in her 145th international match against Australia. More than 30 thousand fans are waiting for him in this friendly match that will serve as a farewell for one of the most recognizable figures in his sport in recent years.
“Absolute legend and pioneer in women’s football,” she wrote. Fran Kirby, Current Brighton player and former Chelsea player.
“Personally, as a football romantic, there is nothing better than ending where it all began. For me, it is very lucky to be able to play on this field again,” said the player when speaking last week about his last game. with the Mannschaft.
While he is enjoying a few days off in Wolfsburg, his future teammates are preparing in Frankfurt for a friendly against England, which they won 4-3 at Wembley, a rivalry reminiscent of Euro 2022 final, won by the English. in the temple of football.
“In fact, it’s not strange to me. The last few weeks have been intense and the short days of free time are very important for me,” he explained at a press conference.
On Monday he will start for the last time with the captain’s armband, “but not full time,” as agreed, the new coach said. Christian Wück, considering that the matches in October are important for his team, in a deep renewal process, with the European title in his sights for next July.
Fate wanted Popp to play her last game in Germany, on October 28, at the same venue as Duisburg, the team with which she made her debut in the Women’s Bundesliga.
Pop will instead be celebrated “as it should be” by the nearly 30,000 spectators expected at the Wedaustadion in Duisbourg, a city in the heart of the Ruhr industrial area, where the player’s career began in the late 2000s: there he played his first Bundesliga match in September 2008 and his first Mannschaft match in February 2010.
Since then, he has become the Mannschaft’s third leading scorer with 67 goals, although he has fallen out for the German team, eight-time European champion between 1989 and 2013 and two-time world champion in 2003 and 2007.
Before heading 350 kilometers east and heading in the summer of 2012 to Wolfsburg, which she would not let go and become the leading club in German women’s football in the 2010s, Pop He won his first trophies with Duisburg, two German Cups (2009 and 2010) and a UEFA Cup (2010).
In almost two decades at the highest level, the player has a tremendous record: two Champions Leagues (2013 and 2014), seven championship titles and thirteen German Cups, in addition to an Olympic title in 2016 in Rio and a final of Euro 2022 .
Often slowed by injuries (he missed Germany’s last continental triumph in 2013), his prominence in Germany at Euro 2022 (he finished as top scorer alongside England’s Beth Mead with six goals, two of them in the semifinals against France). But he was struck by an injury and had to watch the English victory from the full stand (87,000 spectators).
Popp is very hostile about the “equal pay” advocated by American star Megan Rapinoe, who advocates for financial conditions equal to her male counterparts, towards “a level playing field”, for equal access to infrastructure, “so that we can be consistently professional.
Source: La Verdad
I’m Rose Herman and I work as an author for Today Times Live. My expertise lies in writing about sports, a passion of mine that has been with me since childhood. As part of my job, I provide comprehensive coverage on everything from football to tennis to golf.
