Heading to the U17 Women's World Cup

Greetings! As Katja, Katy and I prepare for the U17 Women’s World Cup in Jordan, we hope that you’ll join us along the way. For all three of us, this is our first FIFA tournament; we’re very excited for this opportunity to represent our country!

We’ve been very busy for the past couple of months in preparations. One of the first steps was to successfully pass the fitness test. We took the new fitness test with World Cup standard requirement. For Katja, this involved six 40m sprints and 10 laps of 75m/25m intervals. For Katy and I, we had an extra component to the test – a test of agility and ability to change direction, a critical ability for assistant referees. This test involved a series of sprinting and side stepping in different directions. Then we ran five 30m sprints, and 10 laps of 75m/25m intervals.

In the months leading up to the tournament, we had multiple opportunities to work together on matches. With each game, we focused not only the game decisions, but also on refining our communications (both verbal and nonverbal) and working together as a team, and how to support each other so that we succeed together. We found that we improved each time.

The tournament officially begins on September 30 . The referees will arrive on September 24, for a week of technical training, fitness, and instruction. We are excited to arrive in Jordan and start this journey!