USWNT star Trinity Rodman makes emotional return from injury, needs just minutes to score game-winning golazo

It was a return to play that could not have been scripted better than when it was written by a dream weaver. It is 114 days since the 23-year-old attacker Trinity Rodman Played in a professional football match and almost a year since she last scored a goal, because the American women’s national team player was working back from a long -term back injury.

Rodman let her return from the bank as a late game sub for the Washington Spirit against the Portland thorns On Sunday, and then the fireworks came. After an absence of four months to rehabilitate her back, she scored the game winner in a stopping time with a brilliant strike. A cross in the box through Courtney Brown was flown by midfielder Croix Bethune For an open Rodman near the distant pole, and the wing player the goal was to go home. It was a very emotional moment for the player and her teammates. Take a look:

“We had to adjust a little second half. It was not as clean as we wanted, but still created many opportunities. I am so proud of the team. Of course I have been gone, and they have submitted that work if I have not been here yet, so I am just grateful to be back to the field.

The Washington Spirit wing player is no stranger to health problems with her back. Rodman has had to deal with the tightness of the back since her Rookie season in 2021, and general flare-ups, but posts the Olympic gold medal victory, her back pain deteriorated considerably. In 2025 it is a process and recognition process of leisure time, peace and trying of new methods to manage it back.

In November, after the subject of the NWSL championship of 2024 in pain, Rodman also received long -term leisure time from national team camps. She was not part of January -camps or the 2025 Shelieves Cup selection and spent time building minutes when the regular season of 2025 started in March. She played against Brazil During the international window of April, but after the two-game series, the Washington Spirit said that the player would be away from team activity to manage her injury, without a timetable for her return.

After the game, Rodman spoke about the emotions of her return to play and the work she did to get back to the field.

“It was just the hardest thing I had to go through with an injury and everything. So come back, especially in the home stadium, with the crowd behind me, such a goal scored. You saw, I buried it, I wouldn’t miss it. So yes, I am just very happy to be back. I miss the team. I miss the team.

“I did a lot of work behind the scenes alone. I got fit, of course, not in a team environment, which was quite difficult to replicate as well as possible that I could do alone. But yes, I worked a lot on my endurance. I worked a lot to make my back work as I should go, and I just got to work.