Dennis Schneidler-Imagn Images
Carli Lloyd accomplished just about everything before retiring in 2021. She won two World Cups and two Olympic gold medals and appeared over 300 times for the United States women’s national team.
“When I retired, I was done; I was tapped out mentally, physically,” Lloyd told The Equalizer this week. “I had nothing left in the tank. It was one of those things where that’s all I did for 34 years. So, I really didn’t have a huge itch to play pickup or just be around it.”
That changed recently.
It was December, about two months after giving birth to her daughter, Harper, that Carli Lloyd started to feel the itch to play again.
She was running her local youth soccer clinic in New Jersey when she started to feel that spark again. Around the same time, one of her husband’s friends halfheartedly reached out wondering if Lloyd would play on his co-ed indoor team. The two-time World Cup winner was in.
Now, the local league will serve as part of Lloyd’s preparation for a return to the field in June. She has committed to join former U.S. teammate Heather O’Reilly’s squad at The Soccer Tournament, a 7-v-7 competition with a $1 million, winner-takes-all prize (which O’Reilly’s team won last year). This year, the women’s field will double to 16 teams.
Lloyd will play alongside O’Reilly and former U.S. teammate Ali Krieger. O’Reilly and Krieger headlined last year’s “US Women’s” team that won the inaugural women’s event. Also returning to TST in 2025 are teams representing the North Carolina Courage – who play at WakeMed Soccer Park, site of TST – Angel City FC and popular Welsh club Wrexham.
Lloyd was on the sidelines as a coach for the women’s edition of TST, which has served as a sort of reunion of multiple generations of U.S. women’s players. Past greats such as Carla Overbeck and Mia Hamm have been part of the coaching staff.
“We know each other,” Lloyd said. “We spent more time with each other than our own families and significant others. Nothing’s really changed. We’ve just gotten a bit older and things in our life have changed, but as far as people’s personalities and the way that they play and their style, we all know each other, we’re familiar with one another.
“I think that’s what’s made our group so special over the years. There could never be a national team of 23 Carli Lloyds or Heather O’Reillys. What has made our team so unique and amazing over the years – and successful – is we’ve had a whole different spectrum of players that have offered something different, something special. We’ve all accepted that with one another and that’s what makes us special.”
Lloyd famously scored a hat trick in the 2015 World Cup final and won the Golden Ball at that tournament. She was the goal-scoring hero in the 2008 and 2012 Olympic gold medal triumphs.
Most of her past three years, she said, have been focused on other things. She took up golfing with her husband. The couple spent significant time and energy trying to get pregnant. Lloyd has spoken publicly about her journey to giving birth to her daughter in October, including several rounds of IVF.
Playing in TST in June isn’t the start of a full-scale comeback for Lloyd at age 42, but she’s still a competitor. She said she feels some of those “competitive juices” creeping back in at her local co-ed games, where the quality of play can range greatly from one player to the next.
She’ll be showing up to Cary, North Carolina, in June aiming to do the same thing she did for over a decade with the U.S. women’s national team: win.
“It’s gonna be difficult, it’s gonna be challenging,” Lloyd said. “People are gonna study us and know what we did last year, but I think we all have had that competitive fire in us. Although it may leave from time to time, it comes out pretty quickly; it reemerges. I think it’s going to be no different.”
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