“Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.”
It’s a common expression in sports, but it’s one that Sky Blue FC, a team that hasn’t boasted the same amount of star power as other teams in the NWSL, has embraced, especially over the past couple of seasons when it’s had to rely heavily on its rookies.
But for Madison Tiernan, one of the members of Sky Blue’s 2017 rookie class, that expression exemplifies who she has always been as a player, even back when she was just five years old and playing on her first rec league team.