Alex Gallardo/Associated Press
Mediation talks between the United States women’s soccer team and U.S. Soccer ended without a resolution on Wednesday afternoon, damaging hopes that the sides could avoid a showdown in federal court over a gender discrimination lawsuit filed by the players earlier this year.
The sides had agreed to meet secretly for several days in New York this week, just over a month after the women’s team won its second straight World Cup championship. The mediation sessions were expected to be the most substantive face-to-face discussions between the team and the federation about equal pay and other workplace issues since they hammered out the details of the players’ current collective bargaining agreement in April 2017.