Rhian Wilkinson's Official Website

SOCCER MEDIA REPORTS:

EYE ON THE PRIZE 16th August 2007 By Dan Plouffe, The Suburban

More often than not, championship teams in any sport don’t reach the top in their first attempt. Inevitably, they must face a variety of trials and tribulations before winning the ultimate prize. The West Island’s Rhian Wilkinson understands all that and it’s why she’s not letting a Pan American Games bronze medal for her Team Canada soccer squad get in the way of her lifelong dream — a gold medal. “We obviously wanted to win, but we want to win gold in the World Cup — that is our ultimate goal,” Wilkinson said.

The unfortunate lasting memories for Canada from the July 12-26 tournament in Rio de Janeiro were a 7-0 drubbing at the hands of host Brazil (ranked eighth in the world, one spot ahead of Canada) and a 2-1 defeat to a group of under-20 players from USA in the semifinals.

“Obviously we’re not where we need to be right now,” Wilkinson said after the Canadians rebounded for a 2-1 win over Mexico in the bronze-medal game. “It’s not fitness, it’s not technical, it’s more mental. We’ve got to get ourselves believing in what we can do. It was a hard tournament, but it was good too because we needed to get that out of the way. The crap’s gone now.”

The 25-year-old, a senior national team member since 2003, will now shift her focus towards preparing for a much bigger competition — the FIFA World Cup from Sept. 10-30 in China. Dreams of becoming the world’s best started back when Wilkinson played with the Lac St. Louis Lakers club, where she won a pair of national silver medals.

The Greater Montreal Athletic Association’s 2000 most valuable soccer player competed in other sports at a high level — ringette, hockey and rugby, to name a few. And then there were others where she didn’t do as well, like water polo. “I was the worst goalie Baie d’Urfé pool has ever seen,” she claimed.

Soccer was a better choice for the quick-footed Wilkinson, a forward who combines her speed and power with some skill moves to beat defenders on the right side of the pitch.

The national team training centre in Vancouver is where Wilkinson spends the majority of her time now, the latest stop on a journey that’s taken her to University of Tennessee, Norway and Ottawa, where she played several W-League seasons with the Fury.

“She’ll rally the troops if everyone’s lying around tired and get us to do something,” said St. Hilaire native Amy Walsh, a fellow national team member who has played for the Laval Comètes. “Rhi can never sit by herself for long. She’s an avid reader; she tears through books, but then she gets really bored if she’s not doing that, so she likes to run around and create havoc.”

Wilkinson doesn’t get more than a few weeks in Montreal a year, but when she is there, she loves being able to spend time with family and friends to get a bit of a break from soccer. “It’s always really fun to just relax,” she said. “Residency camp is where I’m set up, but Baie d’Urfé and the West Island is definitely still home for me.”

Wilkinson mentioned she might like to play in Europe again in the future and also that she’d like to get a Masters in English or communications, but she won’t think of anything past September’s World Cup.