After a six-month hiatus, Rose Lavelle has returned to the U.S. women’s national team.
The star midfielder was last with the squad for its final matches of 2024, when it traveled overseas to play both England and the Netherlands. But then she underwent ankle surgery in December and has been recovering ever since.
Lavelle appeared in her first game for Gotham FC on June 7 in a 2-1 loss to Kansas City, and has been building minutes ever since. This week, she’s in USWNT camp ahead of three upcoming matches: two against the Republic of Ireland on June 26 (at DICK’s Sporting Goods Park in Commerce City, Colorado) and June 29 (at TQL Stadium in Cincinnati, Ohio), and one against Canada on July 2 (at Audi Field in Washington, D.C.). It will be the squad’s final camp until October.
Rose Lavelle underwent ankle surgery in December and is getting back into playing form. (Photo by Brad Smith/ISI Photos/USSF/Getty Images for USSF)
“We’re incredibly excited to have her back with us for multiple reasons,” manager Emma Hayes said. “First of all, her personality and character in the locker room has been sorely missed the past six months. She’s supremely gifted as a football player and playing between sort of the eight and ten positions. She’s someone who, I think, as she’s maturing as a top-level footballer, is where her game has been going the last 12 months. She’s starting to add new dimensions in between the lines.”
Lavelle has always been one of the USWNT’s more unique and creative players. She’s left-footed and her finesse on the ball comes naturally. She’s elusive and can slip through the midfield or go on a 50-yard run untouched and score a goal in a World Cup final (as she did in 2019 to lift the USWNT to a 2-0 win over the Netherlands).
“She’s rare,” U.S. legend Megan Rapinoe told FOX Sports ahead of the 2023 World Cup. “I’ve never played with anyone like Rose in my whole career, club or country. She just glides. There’s stuff she can do that nobody else can do.”
Which is why Hayes is so relieved to have her back. Since last summer’s Paris Olympics, when the USWNT won gold for the first time since the London Games in 2012, Hayes hasn’t had her full squad available. For example: Mallory Swanson and Sophia Wilson are both pregnant; Trinity Rodman has been dealing with back issues (though she recently posted an Instagram video of her getting back on the pitch); and Tierna Davidson tore her ACL.
Naomi Girma missed the first part of 2025 with a calf injury, though she has since returned to the national team, and now Lavelle is back, too. If the U.S. had to compete without so many key players, 2025 is the time to do it with the next major tournament not until the 2027 World Cup in Brazil.
Plus, these absences have allowed Hayes to give experience to younger players and broaden the player pool for the future. Hayes has called up 27 new players since she took over the team last year, with 19 earning their USWNT debuts.
This roster is particularly inexperienced. If you don’t count the six players who have been to world championships at the senior level – which includes Lavelle, Girma, Emily Sonnett, Sam Coffey, Lynn Biyendolo and Croix Bethune – the average number of caps in this camp is 3.3 per player.
Which is why the younger players are looking forward to getting the opportunity to train and play with someone like Lavelle during this window.
“I haven’t played with Rose yet, but so far, talking to her and chatting with her off the field – I’ve seen her play – and I’m so excited to build a connection there on the field,” forward Michelle Cooper said this week. “I’m just excited to see her energy and her personality translate on the field and in the locker room.”
Added Emma Sears, who was on a few rosters with Lavelle late last year and shares a love for the state of Ohio (where Lavelle grew up and Sears went to high school and college): “She’s so talented. She’s so technical.”
“And any opportunity I get to play with her,” Sears continued, “I think that is super awesome just to be able to learn from her experience and the way that she sees the field is something that I definitely look up to.”
Laken Litman covers college football, college basketball and soccer for FOX Sports. She previously wrote for Sports Illustrated, USA Today and The Indianapolis Star. She is the author of “Strong Like a Woman,” published in spring 2022 to mark the 50th anniversary of Title IX. Follow her at @LakenLitman.
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