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The U.S. soccer team must be en vogue: Annie Leibovitz was at training Monday to shoot photos.
Leibovitz took photos of four players for an hour on a turf field at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta Training Ground, the practice facility of Major League Soccer’s Atlanta United.
Each of the participating players received an autographed book from the 76-year-old photographer. The outlet that will be using the shoot was not disclosed.
Six American players also were on a grass field having their photos taken for Vogue.
In addition, during the current training camp, players took part in promotion shots for World Cup rights holders Fox and Telemundo, interviews with TNT Sports, which holds U.S. Soccer Federation rights, and World Cup promotional preparation for USSF advertising and marketing partners.
Players here who were not at the November training camp also had to be photographed in the new Nike uniforms that will be used at the World Cup.
U.S. coach Mauricio Pochettino said all the activities took away time from focusing on the friendlies against Belgium, a 5-2 loss Saturday, and against Portugal on Tuesday.
“We need to be fair with the players because the demand of … the media from when they arrived was really intense,” he said. “Yesterday they were so tired and they cannot be seen on the training ground because they wanted to rest a little bit. … The amount of demand(s) for the World Cup make very difficult the preparation for the games.”
Pochettino contrasted this training camp with the November matches, a 2-1 win over Paraguay in Chester, Pennsylvania, and a 5-1 rout over Uruguay in Tampa, Florida, and the October games, a 1-1 draw with Ecuador in Austin, Texas, and a 2-1 victory over Australia in Commerce City, Colorado.
“Philadelphia, Tampa, we were focusing to prepare the game, train and focus on this and this and this and this. Or before again in Austin or in Denver,” he said. “We didn’t do meetings because players going to I don’t know where. Another: ‘Where I need to go where? OK, until (the) last day, we cannot talk about nothing. We were training in the middle, no, and it was tough.”
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AP soccer: https://apnews.com/hub/soccer
