PORTLAND, Ore. – Two years between games at Providence Park spanned lifetimes for Simone Charley. Back then, in 2017, the then-Vanderbilt Commodore was on the bench for the United States’ U-23 national team, playing in the Thorns’ Preseason Invitational, seeing zero minutes in front of a crowd of 6,129.
“The field was packed out,” Charley remembers. For the Thorns, over six thousand fans is just a preseason game. For much of women’s soccer, it’s a crowd.
“I was on the bench the whole game, and I remember just staring, thinking, ‘Whoa, look at all these fans,’” she says “’Look at all these people.