Hello, welcome to full-time with Megalahan. Thanks for tuning into this podcast,

which is all about women's soccer on the Athletic Podcast Network. I am your host as always, as it says in the title, Meglinhan, and I'm a staff writer at The Athletic covering the NWSL and the U.S. Women's National Team. And welcome back. I am back after an attempt of vacation, which mostly went well. And then my first day back to work

this past Monday, my dog ended up at the vet with a minor injury and is now sitting next to me

in a cone. She is both sullen and confused about this turn of events, but she is already

fully back to running and begging for food. And we are fully back here. And we are kicking off

2021 here at full time with Megalindhan with

Shireen Ahmed, a freelance writer, activist public speaker, host of Burn It All Down, and a good friend

to boot even if we discuss later, we might end up on opposite sides of the not-so-friendly USA-Canada

hockey rivalry. But before I fully get back into the swing of things here,

while our holiday promo might have ended, you can still start off your 2021 with a full year

of women's soccer coverage, plus everything else we have to offer at the athletic,

including WNBA, MLS, plenty more by visiting theathletic.com slash full time. And we have an offer running for listeners of this

podcast for $3.99 a month for your new subscription right now. And again, if you subscribe via that

link, you are helping to show that we have been building a market for women's soccer coverage

here at the athletic. So if you want in for this full year of coverage through the NWSL Challenge Cup,

round two, right?

And then the return to a regular season plus the Olympics in a full year for the U.S.

women's national team.

That's Theathletic.com slash full time.

So while the pace wasn't quite at the speed that we are all used to,

the news did keep coming during the holiday break with more trades and signings happening around the league, including the bigger ones of Malpue and Sarah Waldmo

to Chicago and Emily Sondit to Orlando. But one piece of news that I really want to focus on is

...