“I was disappointed,” is how Alyssa Thompson described her absence from the 2024 Paris Olympics. After playing just 17 minutes in the 2023 FIFA World Cup, it seemed all but certain she would make Emma Hayes‘ roster. Yet, the unthinkable happened—as the Angel City star watched her USWNT teammates claim gold from afar. While the heartbreak lit a fire within Thompson to stage a comeback, the question was—how? Well, how about turning to one of your team’s veteran names, say, Christen Press?

Spoiler alert: that’s exactly what the 20-year-old did. While it’s true that Alyssa—who shares both the ACFC and national team locker room with her younger sister, Gisele Thompson—is a mentor to her sibling, the younger one can always turn to her big sister for guidance. But what about Alyssa herself? That’s exactly how she found an older sister figure in CP23.

“I’ve always looked up to her,” Thompson began during an exclusive chat with Just Women’s Sports “As an older sister, I feel like I crave some advice. Because I feel like I’ve always done everything first for my sisters. It’s just been really nice getting to know her as a person. And I feel like I’ve just learned so much from her.”

“Knowing that she was [saying], ‘You can score. I believe in you,’ really gave me a lot of confidence. Like, ‘Yeah, I can. If you believe in me, what can I not do?” added the Los Angeles, California native, revealing how one of her senior-most domestic teammates is helping her navigate all kinds of challenges that once Press faced as a youngster but overcame in her own time.

Come to think of it, former USWNT midfielder Sam Mewis recently touched on a similar topic, suggesting that having Christen as both a “teammate and a mentor is such a valuable tool” for Alyssa—even though it saw things later escalate when Mewis added more fuel to the flame with Becky Sauerbrunn over the ongoing comparisons between Press and Thompson, due to their recent NWSL game prowess.

But coming back, Thompson’s heartfelt confession regarding Press does ring some bells. Last season, the youngster revealed how the former Manchester United forward took her under her wing—earning the veteran a proper ‘mentor’ tag and giving Thompson a major confidence boost. Then again, this brings up not one but two questions. First, how did Press manage to do that? And secondly, how did it help Thompson?

Christen Press was the torchbearer Alyssa Thompson needed

Everyone knows Alyssa Thompson was disappointed to have not made the Paris Olympic roster. But there’s another confession you shall hear about her being aware of that decision. “I knew at that time I wasn’t one of the best forwards that they could have brought,” remarked the Angel City starlet. Talk about self-awareness, as Thompson was able to turn the strides in her own favor.

It was almost as if she took that rejection personally, returning back to her domestic club and working day and night. “I just need to be better,” was the kind of realization that hit her hard. In the meantime, Alyssa had already found a mentor like Christen Press, who, to recall, helped her young ACFC teammate fix one of her biggest mistakes.

“I thought she was taking a bad touch before she shot the ball and I just told her that and she changed her touch and she started scoring. I love that,” Press remarked earlier during her RE—INC podcast talk with Tobin Heath, highlighting that more than the mental side, it was actually improving the technical aspect that helped the talented forward break her goal-scoring deadlock.

The result? Well, Alyssa really couldn’t have enjoyed a more dominant 2024 campaign, recording five goals and seven assists across more than 26 appearances in both regular season and playoff matches—an impressive jump from her rookie year, where she registered four goals and just two assists in 21 games.

On the international front, Thompson was called in for a friendlies post-Olympics, the game vs Iceland, she scored a spectacular debut goal for USWNT. It was a goal that even Emma Hayes acknowledged wasn’t “easy” to score—a chop in from the left before smashing it into the top corner, for your context.

In fact, there hasn’t been a camp since then where Alyssa hasn’t been called up by Hayes. She is proving to be a key starter in the USWNT XI, especially in the absence of Sophia Smith and Mallory Swanson. And all of this happened by making some minor tweaks with her own hard work and a little help from Christen Press.

We’ll wait until you bring us a better redemption story than this one!