Carli Lloyd went after the USWNT after its World Cup draw

The No. 1-ranked United States women’s national team didn’t even finish as the top team in its group — and almost failed to advance past the group stage at the World Cup for the first time ever — after a scoreless draw against Portugal. The tie allowed the Netherlands, which beat Vietnam, 7-0, and previously played the U.S. to a 1-1 draw, to claim the top spot in Group E and set up a likely round of 16 showdown between the Americans and Sweden.

However, the big story following the match wasn’t just a draw that felt like a loss (at least to fans), but the way the team reacted to finishing second in the group.

Sure, the USWNT moved on and avoided elimination, but some, including former team captain Carli Lloyd, who is taking in her first World Cup from the broadcast booth after being a part of four of them as a player (and winning two), took exception to the fact that the players seemed in a celebratory mood after the game.

Those apparently weren’t the only comments from the 41-year-old Delran native. According to ESPN, a journalist relayed her comments to USWNT manager Vlatko Andonovski.

» READ MORE: Chickens, meditation and soccer analysis: Carli Lloyd tackles the World Cup in Fox’s TV booth

“You never want to take anything for granted,” Lloyd said, according to ESPN. “You put on that jersey and you want to give it everything you have, for the people that came before you and the people that are going to come after you, and I’m just not seeing that passion.

“I’m just seeing a very lackluster, uninspiring, taking-it-for-granted, where winning and training and doing all that you can to be the best possible individual player is not happening.”

Those are strong words. Andonovski, however, doesn’t see it the same way.

“The one thing I want to say is that this team wanted to win this game more than anything else,” Andonovski said. “They’ve put everything they could in preparation for this tournament and every game that they go [into], so to question the mentality of this team, to question the willingness to win, to compete, I think it’s insane.

“I’ve never seen this team step on the field and not try hard or not compete. Everyone is entitled to [their] opinion. They can say whatever they want, but I just know how this team feels.

“It’s not like we played well by any means. We owned it. We know it’s not good enough. We’re not happy with our performance, but we qualified for the next round. We’re moving on.”

» READ MORE: Before the Union, the Kixx were Philly’s soccer team, and U.S. manager Vlatko Andonovski played for them

The USWNT has not only reached the knockout stage in every women’s World Cup (since 1991), but it has finished in the top three each time. This year, while the Americans still advanced, they failed to win multiple group stage games for the first time and scored just four total goals in their three group matches.

Now, after finishing second to the Dutch, things aren’t about to get any easier.

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