Following last Saturday’s incident which saw Houston Dash forward Rachel Daly collapse due to heat exhaustion in the closing minutes against the Seattle Reign, a storm of comments on social media began to surface on the kickoff times the NWSL and Lifetime have proposed this season.

The temperature during last Saturday’s game at BBVA Compass Stadium peaked into the 90s for a 3 p.m. game.

That’s something Orlando Pride defender Ali Krieger said needs to be modified for the safety of the players.

“It’s difficult that NWSL scheduled that game at 3. It’s so hot there, and here as well, you can’t have a 3 p.m. game in the middle of the day in Houston,” said Krieger. “If it’s a certain amount of degrees, you need to postpone the game and play it later in the evening when it starts to cool down. Give the teams a fair opportunity, and the safety of the players, that’s most important.

“We’re not out here playing a 2 p.m. game and 100 degree weather, that’s just not ideal. You have water breaks, but that’s not the best idea, you still have a 90-minute game to play,” she added. “I wish that they would pay more attention to the times of the games, hopefully they’ll change that because of what happened, and make sure those TV times in those hot places, like here in Orlando, will hopefully be more night games or earlier in the morning like when I played over in Bundesliga.”

The United States women’s national team stalwart was adamant about seeing some change on kickoff times this season, and remains hopeful on the league addressing the issue soon for the sake of the players.

Since then, the league issued a statement.

Finding winning rhythm 

The Pride aren’t off to their best start to the 2017 National Women’s Soccer League season.

One win in seven games played doesn’t sound like an ideal start but according to Krieger, it’s still early and there’s time to find a winning rhythm as Saturday’s game at Orlando City Stadium against the Boston Breakers approaches.

“Every game in this league, any team can win, and that’s what we understand,” said Krieger. “We’re understanding our principles, we’re still figuring out the little details that we have to clean up. They’re easy fixes, like not giving the ball away, especially on transition. We have the will to win, but we have to implement that during games if we want to see any type of positive result.”

Tickets for Saturday’s game in downtown Orlando can be purchased by clicking here. 

Kickoff is scheduled at 7:30 p.m.

(Photo Courtesy  by Orlando Pride)