Got Hope? This week’s Newsweek sure does. From the story, we learn how she lost her dad, got benched, had shoulder surgery, and tested positive for a banned substance, yet somehow survived it all and put U.S. women’s soccer in position to bring home gold again. Here’s a choice quote:

“An NFL player never has to do any endorsements, and he’s fine,” says Solo. (She hawks Gatorade, Bank of America, and Simple skin care, among other things; an autobiography is due out in August.) “But it doesn’t work that way for us. My soccer salary would only make me an average living. So we can’t just market to little girls constantly. We need to start selling tickets to the masses. To middle-aged men. To all walks of life. At the end of the day, these stupid photo shoots are about bringing more recognition to the game, getting bigger contracts, and putting ourselves on the same level as the men.”

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Andrew Sullivan points us to a Brazilian soccer team’s “ingenious” way to promote blood donations.

Nicknamed the ‘Red and Blacks’, there’s no prizes for guessing what colours Vitoria usually play in. However, ahead of the new season, the club have ‘drained’ the red hoops from their home strip in a bid to raise awareness and get their fans to donate blood for transfusions and the like. The red hoops on the home shirt will then be replaced one-by-one as the level of blood donated rises, until the shirt is eventually restored to it’s former glory when the target is met.

Today in Newsweek archives: Girls Rule!

Yesterday’s dramatic penalty shootout win over Brazil in the semifinals of the 2011 FIFA Women’s World Cup marked the 12th anniversary of this iconic 1999 image, showing defender Brandi Chastain (now an ESPN commentator) just seconds after she secured the penalty for the World Cup win against China (the second win in U.S. history). At the time, international interest in women’s soccer was at an all-time high—and the celebrated match against China was the most-attended women’s sporting event in history. Chastain called it “the greatest moment of my life on the soccer field. The U.S. is set to face France on Wednesday.