NEW YORK — Emma Hayes smiled broadly as she answered questions at the head of a long conference table in a corner room three floors up on bustling Madison Avenue. As the only visual clue to her new role as head coach of the U.S. women's national team, she wore a small U.S. Soccer pin badge on the left side of her light brown blazer.
This is the job she's dreamed of for more than 20 years, the biggest job in women's football. It's the job her late father and best friend, Syd, told her to pursue as he lay on his deathbed in September, it's the job Hayes has discussed with Syd as if it was one she already had, because she wanted her to leave with those memories.
The USWNT coaching position is also an international coaching position, which is very different from the club environments Hayes has worked in throughout her career. Hayes' 12-year tenure as Chelsea head coach saw her become known as one of the best managers in the world.
“I'm not worried,” Hayes told a small group of reporters, including ESPN, on Thursday. “I think it's the same with anybody that goes from one organization to another. Football is 11-on-11 at the end of the day.”
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Her point is valid, but one of the biggest questions surrounding her hiring is how she will navigate the transition after being hired to replace another club coach, Vlatko Andonovski, who struggled to make the transition to international play. Under Andonovski, a championship-winning NWSL coach, the U.S. women's team had a historically poor start to the 2023 World Cup, winning just one of four games en route to the club's fastest elimination from a major tournament in club history.
The hiring of Hayes has been widely hailed as a step in the right direction for the U.S. team. During his 12 years with Chelsea, he won five straight league titles and 16 total trophies. He is arguably one of the best coaches in the game but has never managed a team at international level, where the rhythm of the schedule means less time to work with coaches and players.
In a professional club environment, coaches can micromanage their team every day in training and see the results of those changes in weekly matches. International soccer is a different story. The pace of U.S. team training camps limits on-field coaching to a few days every month or two, with two or three games crammed into each period.
There isn't always an immediate chance to fix a bad performance, and in an international tournament with knockout format – which Hayes will get his first taste of at the Olympics in two months' time – one poor showing could seal the team's fate.
There's a recent, striking and familiar example of how difficult the transition can be. Indeed, the switch between club and country has held many talented managers back. Andonovski was honest about how one of the biggest challenges in making the switch from club to international football was the lack of time to spend with the players.
“I love coaching, coaching every day and working with the players every day,” Andonovski said upon his recent return to the NWSL, “and in a national team environment, you just can't do that.”
Andonovski won two NWSL championships and established himself as one of the league's top coaches before taking over as head coach of the U.S. women's national team in late 2019. He faced numerous challenges on the road to the 2021 Olympics and 2023 World Cup, the most unique of which was the pandemic, and ultimately struggled with the idea that he might have been able to find the right balance for his team if he'd had more regular interaction like he does in club games.
He's back with the club and is thriving again, with the Kansas City Current off to an unbeaten 11-game start under Andonovski.
Mark Parsons also enjoyed success as a coach in the NWSL before taking over as head coach of the Netherlands national team in 2021. He led the Netherlands to a difficult quarter-final exit at Euro 2022, but was released from his contract by mutual consent. Just as the U.S. Soccer Association waited six months before allowing Hayes to finish out this season with Chelsea, Parsons also juggled his time as head coach of the Netherlands national team with his final season with the Portland Thorns throughout 2021.
Hayes will be quick to emphasize her people-first approach and her own personal mantra: She said she plans to speak with Andonovski, his predecessor, Jill Ellis, and others as part of her preparation for the job.
Hayes promises US Women's National Team will play with 'passion'
Emma Hayes explains the style of play she expects the U.S. Women's National Team to adopt under her leadership.
Hayes has a master's degree in intelligence and international affairs. She has a craving to understand how things and people work. She says she's been watching the U.S. Women's National Team video profiles of players' careers and a recent Netflix documentary about the team to learn more about the personalities on her team, but it's not naive or flippant; it's serious.
“When you're managing people, it's very easy to get the best out of people you understand and know, but it's a lot harder when you have to do that with people who are completely different,” Hayes said.
Few people have the personality of Hayes, she joked Thursday, but the head coach of the U.S. women's national team certainly needs a strong presence.
The U.S. women's national soccer team has had some of the most unique players in women's soccer, but that doesn't suit every coach. The laid-back, affable Tom Selmanni was suddenly and infamously ousted as U.S. women's national soccer team coach in 2014. Then-US Soccer President Sunil Gulati denied that Selmanni was fired because of a player revolt, but it was clear that his style didn't fit with what the federation — and the players — wanted.
Meanwhile, Andonovski had worked with some of the players as an NWSL coach when he was hired for the role and was well-liked by the USWNT players, calling them “friends” during the World Cup. But player-turned-commentator Carli Lloyd, who was a critic of her former team during the World Cup, said Andonovski cut training sessions short when players complained they were too tough.
Hayes said she is a good listener and can be firm when needed, but always with empathy. She also has excellent communication skills, which will be important as she transitions from a veteran player to the next generation of the U.S. Women's National Team.
“I'm going to work hard on the culture part, which I've done my whole career,” Hayes said, “because if we don't address that part, like in any workplace, there's going to be a lack of communication and you know what's going to happen. There's going to be conversations, you know. And usually they're the wrong kind of conversations.”
But one of the biggest challenges for the US Women's National Team at the 2023 World Cup has been tactical. When opponents such as Portugal thwarted the US Women's National Team's initial game plan, the players were unable to solve the problem and were rigid in their approach.
Hayes is known for her tactical flexibility, which was evident as she oversaw the team from afar during the six months that interim head coach Twyla Kilgore was in charge, during which the U.S. Women's National Team experimented with different midfield balances, three-at-back formations and overloaded wings.
“The framework, the methodology, the principles of play are perfectly clear and will never change, but the roles may change,” Hayes said. “We have a limited time and we have to simplify.”
Hayes says the days of sole dominance for the U.S. women's national team are over.
New head coach Emma Hayes said the U.S. Women's National Team is no longer the go-to international women's team.
In these circumstances, with only two rest days between Olympic matches, can she execute her tactics successfully, and is the message clear and concise enough to get across at the Olympics?
Whatever the outcome, expectations will need to be kept in check this summer. US Soccer's decision to hire Hayes and wait six months for her to arrive so she could finish her club season with Chelsea was an acknowledgement that she was in it for the long term, even at the expense of a short-term deal. US Soccer knew it had only two months to prepare for the Olympics starting in July, but winning a trophy at the 2024 Olympics may be a necessary sacrifice to win the 2027 World Cup.
One thing is clear about Hayes' transition from the club environment: A weight has been lifted off her shoulders, a “big rock,” she called it. Unlike Andonovski, who craved the daily grind, Hayes grew weary of it over time, especially with a 6-year-old son in tow. A game every three days, press conferences before those, daily player meetings? “I just can't do that anymore, at this very moment,” Hayes said again Thursday.
She's in Denver now meeting with the U.S. Women's National Soccer Team, the first team she can call entirely her own. After a pair of friendlies against South Korea, she'll shuttle between the U.K. and the U.S. before settling in Atlanta, where the U.S. Soccer Federation is building a purpose-built training center.
Hayes, if she can let it, will have some breathing room in late August before sprinting to the Olympics, her first big test on a different type of arena.
“International football has different ups and downs,” Hayes said. “I think the change has reinvigorated it. [me]”I especially felt that today. And of course, in an ideal world, everybody would want to spend a few weeks on a beach somewhere right now. But I think my mindset is really clear: You don't get many opportunities in your life to go to the Olympics.”