The USWNT poses together before a SheBelieves Cup game against Japan wearing their warmup tops inside out to obscure the U.S. Soccer logo. (Photo by Brad Smith/ISI Photos/Getty Images)

After accusations of sexism and the abrupt resignation of president Carlos Cordeiro, U.S. Soccer is changing course.

In the latest back-and-forth round in the ongoing discrimination lawsuit filed by the U.S. women’s national team, U.S. Soccer has backed off its previous legal strategy, which was widely criticized as sexist.

The federation, which previously argued that women are inherently inferior to men, eliminated that defense from its new documents filed Monday. References to the female players performing less-than-equal work because they have less “ability” or “skill” than male players, which U.S. Soccer argued last week, have been removed entirely.

U.S. Soccer still argued that the women’s team and the men’s team are separate from one another, but only because they have different managers, separate budgets and play in different locations — not because the women aren’t doing equal work.

“Last week’s legal filing was an error,” said acting U.S. Soccer president Cindy Parlow Cone in a statement Monday. “It resulted from a fundamental breakdown in our internal process that led to offensive assertions made by the federation that do not represent our core values.”

Parlow Cone, who was promoted from the vice president role after Cordeiro resigned, said the federation had switched law firms, something Cordeiro promised in a last-ditch effort to quell criticism before he resigned. But she went a step further Monday, vowing “a comprehensive review of our internal process.”

“It is our obligation to move quickly to repair the damage that has been done,” said Parlow Cone, a former USWNT midfielder. “I am committed to addressing this issue in an honest, transparent and forthright manner.”

View photos Cindy Parlow Cone, shown during the 2019 Women's World Cup draw, was named acting president of U.S. Soccer after Carlos Cordeiro resigned. (Photo by Dean Mouhtaropoulos/Getty Images) More

USWNT responds to new filings

U.S. Soccer continued to use its other past legal arguments in a kitchen sink approach of trying every possible argument that might work, which is common in a lawsuit like this. Among them, the federation has argued that the women collective bargained for the compensation they received, although the players say they wanted equal pay during negotiations and it was rejected.

Women’s national team spokeswoman Molly Levinson hit back, saying in a statement that “USSF should stop trying to change the conversation and just change.”

“These latest filings demonstrate that USSF has jettisoned its primary legal arguments after losing sponsor and fan support for their blatant misogyny,” Levinson said.

The federation, she added, “is instead now trying to return to the argument which the court has already rejected as ‘absurd’ — the claim that women players were paid more.”

She’s referring to months ago when a judge rejected U.S. Soccer’s argument the women were paid more and thus didn’t qualify for class certification. The judge said it was “absurd” because it failed to take into account that the rate of pay could be lower and the women could’ve worked more.

U.S. Soccer’s previous legal strategy was widely criticized

U.S. Soccer’s previous round of public legal filings, filed one week ago, ignited a firestorm of criticism as the federation argued that the USWNT did not deserve equal pay because, essentially, they are not equal to their male counterparts.

The federation argued that women have less “ability” than men because they have a lower “level of certain physical attributes, such as speed and strength.” U.S. Soccer’s attorneys, apparently realizing that they were attempting to use misogyny to win a lawsuit, preemptively argued that it wasn’t a “sexist stereotype” but “indisputable science.”

The argument itself wasn’t exactly new. After all, U.S. Soccer’s attorneys had been grilling USWNT players in depositions for months about whether they could beat men on the soccer field, excerpts of which had come out previously. But last week’s filing put the unsavory strategy in the bluntest and most blatantly sexist terms yet.