Ashley Sanchez has had a rollercoaster year.
First, in the summer of 2023, the U.S. women’s national team midfielder was named to her inaugural World Cup roster. That revelry, however, was soon spoiled with Sanchez logging zero minutes of playing time in Australia and New Zealand. It was a role she wasn’t prepared for and a drastically different one than what was assigned to her heading into the tournament. The USWNT’s crash out in the round of 16 only made matters worse.
Then, in January, Sanchez was traded from her NWSL club, the Washington Spirit, to the North Carolina Courage. Sanchez described herself as “shocked and heartbroken” in a social media post following the move. She had to bid farewell to the club where she had made her professional debut and won a championship in 2021.
All the while, Sanchez wasn’t being called into USWNT camps and had to watch the squad’s gold medal run at the Paris Olympics from afar.
“I definitely think nobody could’ve really prepared me for something like this,” Sanchez says. “It was one of the hardest years of my career and just in life in general. There was a lot of change and just disappointment.”
But amid the turbulence, Sanchez has been playing some of the most inspired soccer of her career. So much so that Sanchez has played her way back into the USWNT. Almost a year to the day since her last USWNT appearance, Sanchez has returned to the fold, this time under coach Emma Hayes. The 25-year-old was named to Hayes’s 26-player training camp roster for a trio of fall friendlies against Iceland and Argentina (the team’s first match is Thursday in Austin).
Earning her first senior call-up in 2016 at 17 years old and then establishing herself as a national team regular in ’21, Sanchez is no stranger to the USWNT environment. This camp, however, feels different. After all that Sanchez has experienced over the past 15 months, how could it not?
“I’ve just grown so much and I am at the end of the day thankful for it,” Sanchez says. “And just to be back on this team knowing everything I’ve been through just means that much more to me.”
Sanchez enters camp in remarkable form, notching five goals and four assists through 25 matches to help the Courage clinch a spot in the NWSL playoffs. She ranks second in the league in completed live ball passes that lead to a shot attempt (62), fifth in total shot-creating actions (83) and sixth in expected assisted goals (5.1). In September, Sanchez became the first active NWSL player to score against each of the league’s 14 clubs. The secret to her success? Freedom.
“I think at the beginning of the season I was already kind of like, eff this, I guess. I just knew that I could go out and play free.” Sanchez says “I was just kind of like, I am going to go out there and show what I can do and you know, what is the worst that happens, I don’t go into the national team? That was already happening. So I could kind of just play free and do what I wanted and I felt like that was really important for where my career was at the moment.”
It's a beautiful thing to behold when Sanchez’s creative flair is unfettered. Dancing on the ball, she drops defenders with back heels, fake-outs and dizzying spins. Sanchez has been able to get on the ball more with North Carolina, unlocking her full attacking potential. She’s elevated off the ball too, looming in pockets and picking out seams, making her a near-constant threat in the final third.
“It’s kind of given me a chip on my shoulder as well, and just given me confidence,” Sanchez says. “And I think just having coaches that believe in me and see me as a pivotal part of our attack and want me to be on the ball really helps with that.”
This newfound conviction has been a critical shift in perspective for Sanchez, who now prioritizes the present rather than gripping onto an expected outcome. Hayes’s attendance at a late-September matchup between the Courage and Chicago Red Stars was the ultimate test of Sanchez’s new mindset. No one would’ve faulted her for being nervous—she hadn’t had much, if any, contact with the new USWNT coach at the time and was eager to return to the national team fold. But that’s not what happened.
“We were waiting at the half-field line to blow the whistle to start the game and I was just kind of looking around and I was like, that is definitely Emma [Hayes],” Sanchez says. “I feel like in those situations I probably would've been panicked but I felt really calm in that moment and I kind of just told myself, it doesn’t even matter, just play the game that you were going to play.” Sanchez ended the day with three chances created and an 83% accurate pass rate, per FotMob, helping the Courage to a 3–1 win over the Red Stars with Hayes watching on.
The USWNT coach will get an even closer look at Sanchez over the next week in training and with three friendlies on the docket. On a tactical level, Sanchez seems to be a seamless fit with the flexibility and versatility Hayes values, adding a dynamic element to the U.S.’s midfield. For her part, Sanchez says she just hopes to soak up all she can.
“I have zero experience with [Hayes] so I am just going to try to be a sponge as best as possible and learn her style of play and where she sees me on the field and kind of what she wants from me and the team,” Sanchez says.
She may be all business, but her return to the USWNT also marks a full-circle moment for Sanchez. After a destabilizing year, Sanchez has found her footing. This call-up may not ensure an automatic spot on future USWNT rosters, but it has solidified the lessons Sanchez has learned over a trying period. “Nothing is handed to you,” she says, and that’s precisely why Sanchez has worked to release expectations around outcomes that she ultimately has no control over. In savoring the process and focusing on the present, Sanchez has landed back on the USWNT radar, driven by the chip on her shoulder and, above all, energized by a newfound freedom.
This article was originally published on www.si.com as Courage Under Fire: Ashley Sanchez Is Ready for Another Shot at the USWNT.
