© LOC

A relaxed atmosphere, happy memories and the prospect of the next global showdown in 2011 characterised a meeting between OC President Steffi Jones and two-time FIFA World Player of the Year Mia Hamm on Friday 3 July 2009 in Manhattan Beach, 30 kilometres south of Los Angeles, California.

The conversation between the two former players centred on the time they spent together at the Washington Freedom in the Women's United Soccer Association [WUSA], and the forthcoming FIFA Women’s World Cup 2011™ in Germany.

Hamm rates as one of the most popular female athletes in the USA. As a member of the women’s national team, she won the FIFA Women’s World Cup in 1991 and 1999, in addition to gold at the 1996 and 2004 Women's Olympic Football Tournaments. She ended her playing career in the summer of 2004 after scoring 158 goals in 275 international appearances. Since then, she has spent her time managing the Mia Hamm Foundation, which supports young female athletes, and also provides assistance to patients in need of bone marrow transplants.

"No other player has shaped women’s football as positively and strongly as Mia. I would be overjoyed if we were able to welcome her to Germany in 2011 for the Women’s World Cup, because she is the international face of the women’s game,” said Jones.

"I know Steffi very well from our time in Washington, and I’m absolutely sure appointing her OC President was the ideal solution," said Hamm. "Her popularity and her commitment to women’s football mean she’ll make a huge contribution to a successful World Cup. Ever since 2006, we all know the Germans are not simply outstanding organisers, but also welcoming and witty folk, who put on fantastic festivals of football. I think 2011 will be another fairytale summer. I want to be there."

"In the last few years, the German women’s team has set the standards," Hamm added. "Beating Germany in 2011 won’t be easy, but we also have some outstanding players who are already dreaming of winning the World Cup. They’ll be perfectly prepared."

After the meeting, Jones presented her former team-mate with a Germany shirt bearing the number 2011. Hamm’s two-year-old twins Ava and Grace both received toddler-sized German replica shirts.

The highlight of Jones’ four-day trip to the US, which began in Los Angeles on Thursday, is her induction into the Hall of Fame of her former club, the Washington Freedom, on Sunday.