The US Women's National team has split their first two games of their April international window with Japan.

One win, one loss, a lot of good, and a lot to learn.

And we're going to dive into all of it.

Hello, everybody, and welcome to this week's edition of The Late Sub.

I am your host, Claire Watkins.

It is Wednesday, April 15th.

And what a rich text this week of soccer has been with the U.S. playing a really, really nice Japan side who are finally tuned and asking questions.

We've seen older players step up.

We've seen younger players have to learn how to sink or swim.

We've seen some shape changes, some personnel changes, and hopefully a lot of lessons

that they can take into the capper on Friday to try to turn their process into a result.

Let's dig in.

So the US women's national team has made it through two of their three scheduled April

friendlies against Japan with some nice moments, some good competition, and a lot to learn already.

I love this series already. Now I'm like really into it. I think everyone should play a team

this good three times in a row. Japan has been awesome.

I love watching them just as much as I love watching the U.S. In that context, Japan has

actually maybe been a little bit stronger than the U.S. at times. I would say Japan passing

with flying colors. The U.S. has been okay. In terms of vibes, I'm not sure the U.S.

is winning the overall arc of the series so far, but they do have a chance to do so when they

wrap up with the third game on Friday. In two games so far, the results have been split,

which is kind of perfect, I think. The U.S. won the first game, two to one, behind goals from

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