Aline Villares Reis (born 15 April 1989), known as Aline, is a Brazilian professional

footballer A football player or footballer is a sportsperson who plays one of the different types of football. The main types of football are association football, American football, Canadian football, Australian rules football, Gaelic football, rugby lea ...

who plays as a

goalkeeper In many team sports that involve scoring goal (sport), goals, the goalkeeper (sometimes termed goaltender, netminder, GK, goalie, or keeper) is a designated player charged with directly preventing the opposing team from scoring by blocking or i ...

for Al Hilal. Between 2016 and 2021 she made 15 appearances for the Brazil national team. She is also a former

women's football Women's football most often refers to: * Women's association football Women's football may also refer to: * Women's gridiron football * Women's Australian rules football * Ladies' Gaelic football * Women's rugby league * Women's rugby union ...

coach who most recently served as the goalkeeping coach for

Orlando Pride The Orlando Pride are an American professional Association football, soccer team based in Orlando, Florida, that competes in the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL). The Pride began play in the 2016 National Women's Soccer League season, 2016 ...

in the American

National Women's Soccer League The National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) is a women's professional Association football, soccer league and the highest level of the United States soccer league system#Women's leagues, United States soccer league system (alongside the USL Supe ...

(NWSL).

Early life

Aline was born in Aguaí, Brazil. She was inspired to play football as a goalkeeper by

Cláudio Taffarel Cláudio André Mergen Taffarel (; born 8 May 1966) is a Brazilian former professional footballer who played as a goalkeeper. He is the current goalkeeping coach of both club Liverpool, and the Brazil national team. Taffarel began his senio ...

after watching the

1994 FIFA World Cup The 1994 FIFA World Cup was the 15th FIFA World Cup, the world championship for men's national soccer teams. It was hosted by the United States and took place from June 17 to July 17, 1994, at nine venues across the country. The United States w ...

final's

penalty shoot-out The penalty shootout is a method of determining a winner in sports matches that would have otherwise been drawn or tied. The rules for penalty shootouts vary between sports and even different competitions; however, the usual form is similar to pe ...

between

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

and

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

. At the age of 18, she moved to

Orlando, Florida Orlando ( ) is a city in and the county seat of Orange County, Florida, United States. The city proper had a population of 307,573 at the 2020 census, making it the fourth-most populous city in Florida behind Jacksonville, Florida, Jacksonville ...

, in the United States to play college soccer.

College career

Aline was a four-year starter for the University of Central Florida Knights women's soccer team from 2007 to 2011, and earned

NSCAA The United Soccer Coaches (formerly known as the National Soccer Coaches Association of America (NSCAA)) is an organization of American soccer coaches founded in 1941. It is the largest soccer coaches organization in the world, with more than ...

All-Central Region and All-Conference-USA honours in all four of her playing seasons. She started all but two matches for the UCF Knights and totalled 2,278 minutes during her college career. After sitting out 2007 with an injury, the NSCAA named her a second-team

All-America The All-America designation is an annual honor bestowed on outstanding athletes in the United States who are considered to be among the best athletes in their respective sport. Individuals receiving this distinction are typically added to an Al ...

n in her

redshirt Redshirt, Red Shirt, or Redshirts may refer to: Sports * Redshirt (college sports) Redshirt, in United States college athletics, is a delay or suspension of an athlete's participation in order to lengthen their period of eligibility. Typically ...

freshman season of 2008, making her the first UCF Knight to be named an All-American since 1995. She finished her collegiate career ranked second in program history in saves (347), fourth in shutouts (28), and sixth in goals-against average (1.04), and was named UCF's top player in the Conference-USA era.

Club career

Before her collegiate career, Aline played for

Guarani FC Guarani Futebol Clube, colloquially called Guarani, is a Brazilian association football club in Campinas, São Paulo. Guarani is the only club not based in a state capital or coastal city to have won the top tier of the Brazilian Championsh ...

for over six years. In 2012, following her collegiate playing career, Aline played professionally in Finland with first-division side . Her visa expired before the end of her only season with the club. She then worked as the director of soccer operations for her alma mater, UCF, while pursuing a master's degree in sport and exercise science. In late 2013, Aline joined the

UCLA Bruins women's soccer The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California, United States. Its academic roots were established in 1881 as a normal school then known as the southern branch of the Ca ...

coaching staff as a volunteer goalkeeping coach. In December 2015, she temporarily left UCLA to play for Ferroviária in Brazil. Following the 2016 Summer Olympics, she returned to the United States and UCLA, and also played for

Santa Clarita Blue Heat Santa Clarita Blue Heat is an American women's soccer team based in Santa Clarita, California, a suburb of Los Angeles. Founded in 2010, the club was known as the Ventura County Fusion for its first two years of existence. The team plays its ho ...

of the pro-am

United Women's Soccer United Women's Soccer (UWS) is a national pro-am Women's association football, women's Association football, soccer league in the United States. The league was founded in 2015 as a response to the dual problems of disorganization in the Women's ...

league. In 2017, Aline left UCLA to play in the Hungarian top women's league for ETO FC, but left the club along with the other international players due to not being paid their salaries. In 2018, Aline signed to play in the Spanish Primera Iberdrola with UDG Tenerife, where she played for four seasons. Aline announced her retirement from professional football on 30 January 2022, but after her suspension as a coach from the Orlando Pride in 2022, she resumed her playing career and re-signed with Tenerife in January 2023, She started 11 matches and recorded 32 saves and two

clean sheet In team sports, a shutout ( US) or clean sheet ( UK) is a game in which the losing team fails to score. While possible in most major sports, they are highly improbable in some sports, such as basketball. Shutouts are usually seen as a result of ...

s during the remainder of the

2022–23 Liga F The 2022–23 Primera División Femenina de Fútbol season, renamed Liga F (finetwork Liga F for sponsorship reasons), was the 35th edition of the Primera División Femenina de España de fútbol, and the first edition with professional status i ...

season. One of her two shutouts on the season was against

Real Madrid Real Madrid Club de Fútbol (), commonly referred to as Real Madrid, is a Spanish professional Football club (association football), football club based in Madrid. The club competes in La Liga, th ...

, in a 1–0 victory on 18 March 2023 that ended Madrid's 14-match unbeaten streak.

International career

Aline was first called to the

camp in July 2009 during her college career. She attended several training camps and friendly matches with Brazil without making an appearance. In 2016, following her season with Ferroviária, Brazil named Aline to the national team roster and signed her to a residency contract with the Brazil national team ( Seleção Permanente) to prepare for the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics (), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad () and officially branded as Rio 2016, were an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 2016 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, with preliminary events i ...

in Rio. Brazil named Aline as one of two goalkeepers on the final 18-player Olympic roster and debuted for the national team during the games, playing the full match of a 0–0 draw against

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the Southern Africa, southernmost country in Africa. Its Provinces of South Africa, nine provinces are bounded to the south by of coastline that stretches along the Atlantic O ...

in front of 42,000 people at the

Arena da Amazônia Arena da Amazônia (''Amazon Arena'') is a Association football, football stadium in Manaus, Amazonas (Brazilian state), Amazonas, Brazil, located on the former site of the Vivaldão stadium. The stadium has an all-seater capacity of 42,924 and ...

. Brazil also named Aline to the national team squad for the 2018 Copa América, which Brazil won, and for the

2019 FIFA Women's World Cup The 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup was the eighth edition of the FIFA Women's World Cup, the quadrennial international Women's association football, football championship contested by 24 List of women's national association football teams, women's ...

and as an alternate for the

2020 Summer Olympics The officially the and officially branded as were an international multi-sport event that was held from 23 July to 8 August 2021 in Tokyo, Japan, with some of the preliminary sporting events beginning on 21 July 2021. Tokyo ...

Coaching career

From 2013 to 2016, Aline spent four seasons as a volunteer goalkeeping coach for the

program under head coach Amanda Cromwell, who had been Aline's coach at UCF. Aline helped develop Katelyn Rowland, who set NCAA career and single-season shutout records during her UCLA career. The Bruins won a national championship and led the nation in goals against average in 2013. On 31 January 2022, professional club

of the American

(NWSL) hired Aline as its goalkeeping coach, reuniting her with Cromwell. On 10 October 2022, following the publication of a joint league and

NWSL Players Association The National Women's Soccer League Players Association (often known as NWSL Players Association or NWSLPA) is the officially recognized union of players in the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL). History The NWSLPA was formed in May 2017 un ...

investigative report into the

2021 NWSL abuse scandal Players and former staff of teams in the National Women's Soccer League (NWSL) have leveled several allegations and formal reports of sexual abuse, harassment, misconduct, and manipulation, as well as weight-shaming, verbal and emotional abuse, ...

, the NWSL placed Aline on unpaid administrative leave, and fired Cromwell and Pride assistant coach Sam Greene. The report alleged that Aline had not cooperated with the joint investigation and also pressured players to provide positive feedback to investigators. Aline was invited to be the pioneering athlete to create her own "masterclass" in Brazil for "Classe das Campeãs", featuring Olympic athletes. In a series of eight episodes, Aline shared experiences as a coach and an athlete, goalkeeping skills, and techniques to develop

emotional intelligence Emotional intelligence (EI), also known as emotional quotient (EQ), is the ability to perceive, use, understand, manage, and handle emotions. High emotional intelligence includes emotional recognition of emotions of the self and others, using ...

and a strong mental game.

ESPN Brasil ESPN is the Brazilian division of ESPN Inc. Launched in March 1989 as Canal+, it was the first country-specific version of ESPN outside the United States, launched in June 1995. The channel has covered major sporting events, like the 1996 Summer ...

aired the series "Jornada Aline Reis" on 9 March 2022.

Honors

; UCF Knights (player) * Conference-USA regular season: 2007, 2009, 2010 ; Brazil (player) *

Copa América Femenina The Copa América Femenina (''Copa América Feminina'' in Portuguese), previously the ''Campeonato Sudamericano de Fútbol Femenino'' (''Campeonato Sul-Americano de Futebol Feminino''), usually shortened to ''Sudamericano Femenino'' (''Sul-America ...

2018 Events January * January 1 – Bulgaria takes over the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, after the Estonian presidency. * January 4 – SPLM-IO rebels loyal to Chan Garang Lual start a raid against Juba, capital of ...

; UCLA Bruins (goalkeeping coach) * NCAA Division I national championship: 2013 * Pac-12 conference championship: 2013, 2014 Individual * UCF Athletics Hall of Fame: Inducted 2019 * Premio Marca (top Iberoamerican player in Spain's top division): 2021

References

External links

* *
Liga F player profileUDG Tenerife player profile2016 Olympics player profileUCF player profileUCLA profile
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Aline Reis 1989 births Living people Footballers from São Paulo (state) Brazilian women's footballers Women's association football goalkeepers UCF Knights women's soccer players Campeonato Brasileiro de Futebol Feminino Série A1 players UD Tenerife players Liga F players United Women's Soccer players Brazil women's international footballers Olympic footballers for Brazil Footballers at the 2016 Summer Olympics 2019 FIFA Women's World Cup players Footballers at the 2020 Summer Olympics Brazilian expatriate women's footballers Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in Spain Expatriate women's footballers in Spain Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in the United States Expatriate women's soccer players in the United States Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in Finland Expatriate women's footballers in Finland Brazilian expatriate sportspeople in Hungary Expatriate women's footballers in Hungary UCLA Bruins women's soccer coaches Brazilian football managers Orlando Pride non-playing staff 21st-century Brazilian sportswomen