WHAT A YEAR THIS GAME WAS
okay, it’s minute 76 of utah royals vs portland thorns and in what is probably the most chaotic three minutes in all of 2019 soccer, this happens:
emily sonnett, in an accidental attempt to kick things into overdrive, proceeds to tap amy rodriguez like one of those rodents you whack at the carnival sending her headlong into the turf and lindsey michelle horan HAS. HAD. IT. i know what you’re thinking: isn’t sonny the star or this capital C chaos? no, it’s lindsey.
first of all, i’m in love with her. second, the great horan has spent this entire game pushing and screaming and shoving, so that fucks! but let’s get back to a-rod, who in the midst of falling face first onto the field, hears: RECORD SCRATCH-FREEZE FRAME-YEP, THAT’S ME and instead of clutching an ankle and wondering how she got into this situation until a foul is called, she springs from the grass like a cat on it’s 8th life and proceeds to yell, not regular, but BLOODY murder to the entirety of rio tinto stadium:
she is PISSED. she wants a foul, a red card, and probably the keys to a mansion in beverly hills at the rate the ref has pranced over to her defense— like okay law and order, we get it, you literally hold the cards afaksksk. if that weren’t nuts and granola crazy enough, a-rod decides soccer isn’t any fun without a chaotic outburst and i’d be out of a job (lol i wish someone would pay me to do this) and realizes: why accept this utterly plebeian form of justice when you can… start a brawl in the middle of the pitch!
she marches over to sonnett like she’s invading a small country or kicking off a protest in the street, sending her ponytail sashaying with the sort of supermodel swagger tyra banks would be proud of. if this were a made-for-tv musical, someone’s honor would be defended by a dance-off. but this isn’t hollywood and no one is pirouette-battling to a synth-pop beat. instead this is a friday night in sandy, utah and apparently that’s all it takes for 22 people to go from earnestly playing sports to completely fucking losing it. because let’s be realistic, this is a chaotic choice. screaming and pointing at a confused frat daddy junior is chaotic. defending your ten sheets to the wind teammate while also stopping her from starting a revolution is pure, that’s right, chaos. dagný brynjarsdóttir, appearing utterly unfazed by this whole thing but still managing to scream ‘HEY’ really loudly from two feet away is one thousand percent chaotic. and still more chaos ensues when lindsey and tobin arrive:
lindsey could maybe buy a little zen garden and rake some sand around but instead she settles for one tiny tap of aggression and low-key look at this restraint, she’ll be saving that energy for later. tobin however literally shoves two people, and maybe the earth’s center of gravity, into next week the way you would shove someone into on-coming traffic in the middle of rush hour. never mind the fact that her girlfriend (wife?) is wearing the same jersey as the enemy. never mind SPORTS BEING PLAYED. tobin, who historically cannot be bothered to spare one simple fuck for shenanigans, has stolen the flag of chaos and is now waving it wildly across the field. honorable mention goes to christine ‘get off my lawn’ sinclair for the arm swinging/head nod combo that seems to say, “yeah, and don’t come back to utah, either!” but take a look at one emily sonnett crossing the middle of the screen as she…
SLINKS QUIETLY AWAY??? WTEF. sonnett took one look at this family-dividing mess of a murder and said, ‘NO MA’AM, NO HOW.’ she is in and out of this crime scene like a thief in the night. she just, and i cannot stress this enough, strikes the match for this dumpster fire then floats over that river of chaos like a baby in a basket. AND LITERALLY NO ONE NOTICES because they’re too busy grasping at the last desperate straws of sanity. PHEW. even becky sauerbrunn is like ‘linds, chill’ and lindsey gives her a look like, ‘team usa, MY ASS.’
so for the first time in her freshman frat boy life, emily ‘well what happened was’ sonnett decides to act like the only adult on the field and casually goes to check in with the ref. with the mass hysteria going on, it’s clear red refy has completely forgotten sonnett’s previous offenses and the gentle, some may even call it soft, elbow touch alerts him to the fact that her playing time is over but not forgotten. sonnett takes one long walk back to the bench and just when we think things have taken a turn for the mundane, lindsey love of my life horan decides, IT’S TIME TO RUN THIS MF TRAIN AGROUND:
lindsey takes one look at a-rod standing over the ball and charges over like some little christmas elf about to pilfer frosted cookies, yeets her a foot off the ground, and then casually scampers away because LINDSEY SAID NO ONE TREATS FRAT DADDY JUNIOR THAT WAY. LINDSEY SAID GAY RIGHTS. LINDSEY SAID WORLD PEACE AND DIVINE UNIVERSAL ORDER. she just launches her with the velocity of a ten-ton truck, backwards, WITH A FLIP. (another special s/o to dagný brynjarsdóttir because wtef do they pipe into the water in iceland that no amount of first-hand murder witnessing will ever phase her?? SHE LITERALLY LOOKS UP THEN LOOKS AWAY HOLY FUCK)
idk what lindsey is saying here but she’s screaming. and if you listen closely, you can hear laura harvey screaming. everyone is screaming. in fact, everyone is losing it. FFS WHERE ARE THE LOCUSTS?? but also, if ever you were going to order more soup for say, twenty-five people at an italian fast-casual restaurant and then encourage the waiter to throw in free breadsticks, it might look something like this?? maybe a teammate of club and country can help calm things down…
with an ass pat??? ad franch, my guy, it is too late for ass pats of tranquility. you tried. but that card the ref is hunched over is yellow and it has lindsey’s name on it. does she care? no. but for the for the rest of the game, lindsey will roam from box to box, leaving no square of grass un-crunched, daring any utah player, even the injured ones somewhere hundreds of miles away on a stationary bike slowly pedaling through rehab training, to challenge her. she is both lonesome cowboy and trusty hunting dog, tracking signs of royals blood through the vast plains of utah and that distant sound you hear? lindsey. howling in the name of emily ann sonnett at the crescent moon.
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