Marta already has an illustrious legacy, but this year with Pride was one of her best ever
KANSAS CITY, Mo. – Last week Marta was angry.
When she stands on the field facing the goal, the three-time Olympic silver medalist usually visualizes herself repeating what she has done many times in her long career. She lets the joy flow through her, to her left foot and into the ball.
But she got a little excited about the opposition in last weekend’s NWSL semifinal between her Orlando Pride and the Kansas City Current.
“I tried to be nice most of the time during the game,” Marta told an enthusiastic crowd of reporters around her table at NWSL Championship media day on Thursday.
There was a player on the Current with whom she exchanged nice words, according to the Brazilian. But the player, Marta declined to name names, was “a bit of a diva”.
“And I said, ‘Wow, okay. You made me angry. I’m going to compete against you one-on-one,'” Marta said.
Marta picked up the ball in the center circle after forward Barbra Banda poked it away from current defender Kayla Sharples. Marta faked out both Sharples and center back Alana Cook as they tried to challenge her, fired past goalkeeper Almuth Schult and got the shot in before outside back Hailie Mace could do anything, scoring the Pride’s crucial third goal in the 82nd minute of an eventual 3 -2 victory.
It was another reminder, as if it was needed, that Marta is truly one of the best to ever play.
She celebrated with mixed emotions, anger and joy, fighting for dominance. But for Marta it felt the same as so many other goal celebrations before. At media day, she almost reached for her phone to pull up a photo of her celebrating a goal with Brazil, for comparison to what turned out to be the winning goal that sent her to her first NWSL final.
“Honestly, what I see is that maybe we should try to piss her off. She is running on a whole different level,” Pride teammate Morgan Gautrat said with a laugh.
Other Pride players spoke of watching the goal repeatedly, from different angles, but no one expressed surprise. They see it regularly.
“Nothing has changed,” Marta said. “I have a passion for this game and that’s why I still play.”
Much like the potential to finally earn an Olympic gold medal with Brazil in the summer at age 38, Marta doesn’t need an NWSL championship trophy to cement her legacy as a force in U.S. professional women’s soccer. She has already won a title and a shield here in 2010 with FC Gold Pride during the previous professional league era of the WPS. And the Pride already captured a trophy this year by winning the NWSL Shield for most regular season points.
She reiterated Thursday that she plans to play two more years, even though she is a free agent heading to the NWSL this offseason. But when she finally hangs up her boots, Marta will have one of the best chances of any international player entering the National Soccer Hall of Fame on the back of a club career.
Marta warms up during practice ahead of the NWSL Championship. (Jamie Squire/Getty Images)
Yet this season is special. Marta said this is the best she has ever had at club level, even compared to her days in Sweden with one of the strongest teams in Europe at the time, Umeå IK.
“If I achieve this big goal with this great team, great,” said Marta. If not, this season has been so special from the beginning until now that it wasn’t even close to the best dream I could imagine.”
When asked during the final press conference before the finals where this NWSL championship ranks in her illustrious career, Marta pointedly raised a finger: number one.
“I think because of the way we’ve done throughout the season from the beginning until now, it’s something really special that I’ve never experienced at any other club I’ve played for,” she said. “It’s hard to win the games at all (in NWSL), like almost all games.”
Marta joined the Pride in 2017, a year after their first season as an expansion team. The team featured some big names, from Alex Morgan to Ali Krieger. They achieved good results in Marta’s debut year and made it to the play-offs. However, the Pride never finished higher than seventh place over the next five seasons (not including 2020, when a regular season was not played due to the pandemic). In 2023 they reached seventh place again and missed the play-offs on the last day by two goals in the standings.
“(Marta) remembers the hard times. She remembers when we were the laughing stock of the league,” head coach Seb Hines said Friday. “Now she enjoys it. Now everything is coming together. We have a great culture. We have great players here. We have structure from top to bottom now, and so she’s probably reminding herself of how it used to be, and just enjoying every moment of how it is now.
As much as the external focus is on Marta this week, especially after that goal in the semi-final, she doesn’t feel that external pressure at all. She is not deterred by the high demand for her from the media, or by a few videos during a championship week. She has never experienced the madness of an NWSL Championship as a finalist, but she has experienced many World Cups and Olympics. She is also not focused on herself as an individual.
“It’s not this player (or) this player, it’s the team,” she said. “We do it together. This is exactly how it should be. It’s not about one or two players, it’s about the project. It’s about the work that everyone has done. If the trophy comes to us, great. If that is not the case, we will continue to work hard.”
Marta celebrates with teammates after scoring a goal against De Stroom. (Mike Watters / image)
From the outside, it’s easy to assume that the team would love to win a championship title for Marta. And while that’s not incorrect, says Haley Carter, Pride’s general manager, it’s also not the only internal story that drives them. From her front row seat, Carter said Marta embodies the team culture every day and this is a group of players who truly love each other.
“This is actually what makes her great,” Carter said at media day. “This gives her legendary status: everything revolves around the team. It’s not about, ‘I’ve never won an NWSL title. I’ve never won the competition.’ That’s not what it’s about. It’s about putting the team in the space to be successful. That is her priority.”
Marta was also crucial on the pitch for the Pride. Much of her success this year, including her nine goals and an assist during the regular season, as well as her two play-off goals so far, has come not just from her return to form, but from a slightly more advanced position on the pitch . She had been closer to the goal and adding Banda to the mix only helped.
If you look at her touches over the past three seasons, the Pride are essentially getting 12 percent more from Marta in the final third this year.
It worked, to say the least.
There are also the intangible assets. And for a player of Marta’s stature and legacy, they are impossible to overlook.
“She has given so much to this club. She really gave it her all. She’s never been on another team in this league, so it’s part of her. She knows what it means to play for this team. She knows what it means to play for this badge,” Hines said at his pre-game press conference on Friday. “Take away all the individuality of the dribbling and shooting and all that, her basic principles of football when you see someone with a build doing it, there are no questions left for anyone else to do it, young, old or whatever.”
Tonight against the Washington Spirit at CPKC Stadium in Kansas City, the Orlando captain will lead her team for the last time in 2024. She will almost certainly face a hostile crowd, including locals who didn’t like last week’s goal is forgotten or Marta who silences them. the Pride’s 2-1 win over the Current there before the Olympic break.
But there will be at least one person in the stands who has never seen her play in America before: her mother.
Marta told me The Athletics On Thursday she said she had finally managed to help arrange a visa for her mother to attend a match in the United States and that a relative had been able to take two weeks off to travel with her and help her get around. For Marta, it was the perfect time for her mother to finally see her play a professional match in the United States. Sure, they had to run around Thursday morning to buy more cold weather gear for her mom so she could be prepared for the cold of Kansas City in November, but it was all worth it.
“She told me this year: ‘If I don’t come to America and then die, I will die so sad’.” Marta couldn’t help but mimic her own expression of disbelief at the heightened level of maternal guilt. “And I said, ‘Mom! Why do you have to be like this?’.”
All week, Marta was just laughing and joking as she immersed herself in a game that was the highlight of her eight years in Orlando. But despite the Brazilian’s obvious joy, she may also get a little angry tonight and provide another magical moment this season.
Jeff Rueter contributed to this story.
(Top photo: Nathan Ray Seebeck / Imagn Images)
