Abby Wambach’s nose was broken. Or maybe it wasn’t.
“I don’t know,” the U.S. soccer star said Sunday afternoon. “I don’t want to know. I don’t care, honestly.”
Upon hearing this, one of Wambach’s biggest fans could only shake her head and sigh. Broken nose? Nothing new.
“I’ve seen a lot of those,” said Judy Wambach, Abby’s mom.
And thus unfolded the best Mother’s Day soccer story ever — or at least the best that has ever involved a dripping bloody face, a surprise party at the San Jose Fairmont Hotel and an American futbol victory over an overmatched island nation.
“It was so exciting,” said Judy Wambach.
She wasn’t talking about her daughter’s mushed nose. Judy was summing up the warm and fuzzy events that concluded with the U.S. women’s national team romping to a 3-0 decision over Ireland at a sold-out Avaya Stadium.
The fun actually began a night earlier. In preparation for next month’s World Cup in Canada, the U.S. players have been training hard in Los Angeles the last few weeks. So as a special treat, Fox Sports Network flew in all of their moms unannounced to show up at Saturday evening’s team dinner inside a Fairmont banquet room.
The players were told only that special guests would be coming to address them. A door opened and the first person to enter was the mother of defender Ali Krieger. Wambach and the other players looked at each other.
“I was like, what is Ali’s mom doing here?” Wambach said. “I thought she was going to be our motivational speaker or something.”
But then all the other moms followed in a procession. This led to many delighted shouts and warm hugs. The celebration continued into the evening. It resumed on the team bus to the Earthquakes’ new stadium on Sunday morning. The U.S. players spend most of their time with club teams all over the country and the world. For many, this was the first Mother’s Day spent with their moms in a long, long while.
“Our whole team was so surprised,” said U.S. goalie Hope Solo.
After warm-ups, for a sweet pregame picture, all of the mothers stood next to their daughters as they lined up for introductions and took their turns waving to the crowd. It’s unclear if any moms were asked to bring orange slices for halftime. But they all soaked up the scene from the stands and received point-outs from their daughters during breaks in the action.
Judy Wambach, who lives in Rochester, N.Y., had the most crazy up-and-down day as she watched her daughter, the all-time leading U.S. scorer. Abby Wambach put two balls in the net for her 179th and 180th national team goals. Abby also smashed her nose badly — once in the first half and even more violently in the second half, when she chased a lofted ball toward the net and her face collided with the left elbow of Irish goalie Niamh Reid-Burke.
The crowd of 18,000 groaned. Abby dropped to her knees. Blood began flooding out of her nostrils onto the turf. A trainer brought a towel. Abby walked to the sidelines, flashing a thumbs-up at Judy before getting repairs and returning to the field.
Abby Wambach initially didn’t want to discuss the gory details. But she finally pointed the index fingers of each hand in both directions beside her nose and joked: “I think in the first half, it went that way and in the second half, it went this way.”
That sounds right, given Abby’s no-fear pathology. She plans no major repair work on the nose because with the World Cup scheduled in just a few weeks, what’s the point? It shows you how much the upcoming tournament means to her and to the team.
The U.S. women have a curious international record. They have dominated the Olympics, with four gold medals in their five appearances since 1996. But the World Cup, which began in 1991, has been a frustrating counterpoint. The U.S. has won just two of the six Cups — the last one way back in 1999 on the famous Brandi Chastain overtime penalty-kick goal.
This year’s U.S. team will not be favored to win in Canada. But it should be right in the mix — even if Sunday’s game didn’t give us much to digest in assessing the squad’s progress. Ireland has never qualified for a Women’s World Cup tournament and officially registered zero shots on goal Sunday. Some of the airplanes next door at San Jose Mineta International Airport runways taxied closer to Solo’s goal mouth than the Irish attackers. The U.S. women, who had trouble with timing and finishing, probably should have won by six or seven goals, not just three.
Of course, that’s why teams play pretournament tuneup matches. And the sight of Abby Wambach doing her goal-scoring stuff — she nearly had a third goal but just missed — was a positive.
“To me, that means she’s back,” said Solo.
Wambach, the player, turns 35 in a couple of weeks. This is likely her last bite at the World Cup apple and she’s yet to play on a Cup champion. Wambach, the mom, is in the process of making novenas back home to pray for the U.S. and Abby’s success.
“It’s a hugely important thing for her,” said Judy. “Because this is the one thing that’s eluded her.”
The U.S. motto is: One Nation. One Team. After Sunday’s result, you can add: One Expected Victory. One Bloody Nose. One Pretty Darned Cool Mother’s Day Card.
Read Mark Purdy’s blog at blogs.mercurynews.com/purdy. Contact him at mpurdy@mercurynews.com. Follow him on Twitter at twitter.com/MercPurdy.
