A high school teammate of Jamaican captain Allyson Swaby. Childhood friends whose bond was forged on the soccer field while competing over the goalkeeper slot in their team. And, a software consultant in a USWNT jersey, laptop open and almost at work.
These are just a few of the people you will encounter over the course of this story. It’s a story about women’s soccer, fandom and late nights in the nation’s capital and how those spectacularly collide during this year’s FIFA Women’s World Cup. In late June, Washington, D.C., passed the “2023 Women’s World Cup Emergency Amendment Act of 2023” to enable bars in the area to stay open for extended hours. It was an attempt to help bridge the 15 hours or so time difference between the District and the tournament’s host countries, Australia and New Zealand. The USWNT’s first two group stage games were at 9 p.m. ET, but the third, a brutal 3 a.m. ET — Yikes.
So, when bars in the area — colloquially known as the DMV for District of Columbia, Maryland, Virginia — took to social media to announce watch parties for the USWNT’s early-morning clashes, I was curious. What could possibly make you leave home at midnight to watch a game with strangers? Would anyone even turn up? Well … I would. But growing up in India and being a fan of European soccer meant a childhood of watching games at odd hours, FC Barcelona jerseys on and nestled into a quilt. And now, in D.C, I intended to find out.
My researched game plan for the night was scrawled arrows between bar names on a partly scrunched tissue.
Four games. Four stops. On maybe four hours of sleep?
The night, balmy. The mood, awake but not quite. But the mission, simple: Who’s at the bars, and why?
