It’s Time People Forgive Korbin Albert

 

It’s Time People Forgive Korbin Albert

There are moments when a sport has to decide what it truly stands for. Women's football, at its heart, has never just been about results. It's about resilience, community, and the grace to rise after we stumble. That’s why it’s time — long past time — that people begin to forgive Korbin Albert.

Let’s be honest. She made a mistake. A public one. One that hurt people. No one is asking us to forget. But what makes women’s football so beautiful, so different from the world that too often surrounds it, is this: we are allowed to grow. Or at least we should be.

Korbin is not just a player. She’s a symbol now, whether she wanted to be or not. A symbol of how quickly we elevate talent, and just as quickly cut it down. But she is also a young woman with a fire in her game that you don’t coach — you feel it. That midfield presence, the eye for goal, the stamina, the willingness to carry a team when it matters — you don’t throw that away.

Her performances for PSG, and more recently for the U.S. national team, prove what anyone who's really been watching already knows: she belongs. Not just on the field, but in the future of this sport. And the only question left is — will we let her? Or will we keep holding on to outrage, even after she's apologized, even after she's tried to learn?

Women's football has always been better than that. This is the game where players run over to lift opponents off the ground. Where champions embrace the beaten. Where rivalries don’t have to mean hatred. Where locker rooms are safe spaces, and courage comes in many forms — including the courage to change.

No one is saying we shouldn’t hold people accountable. But accountability isn’t the same as exile. Growth doesn’t come from silence and shame — it comes from open hearts, and open doors.

We’ve lost enough talent over the years to injuries, to burnout, to being undervalued. Let’s not lose more because we forgot how to forgive.

Korbin Albert is too good to leave behind. And more importantly — she’s still becoming. Let her.