Lindsey Horan stepped onto the field for a training session with the Portland Thorns Tuesday afternoon. It was her first practice since suffering a quadriceps injury more than a month ago. While she was limited in what she could do on the field, Horan was elated to be back on the pitch.

“I’m a lot better,” Horan said. “I’m progressing. Obviously, it’s a frustrating little injury, but I’m four or five weeks out (from when I sustained the injury) and I’m doing really well. I was back on the field yesterday and today, which was exciting.”

The U.S. Women’s National Team announced in early February that Horan would miss the SheBelieves Cup in March due to injury. It was a major blow for the 24-year-old, who is gearing up for her first World Cup this summer.

Horan was forced to watch from afar as the USA finished second in the SheBelieves Cup this week. The tournament was seen a disappointment for the United States, who are the defending Women’s World Cup champions and are favored to win the 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup in France this summer.

“To be perfectly honest, it sucked,” said Horan about watching the national team compete from afar. “It’s very hard to watch your team and not be there, but it’s also cool in a different way. You get to watch them from a different perspective and you see everything and you get to analyze the game... I thought we were so great on so many levels and then there were, obviously, a lot of mistakes that happened and some defensive errors. I personally think this is the time to have those errors and we got to learn from them.”

Due to her injury, Horan returned to Portland earlier than the rest of the Thorns’ national team players to rejoin the club when it opened preseason training camp.

While Horan took a big step forward by jumping into limited training this week, she said she was still unsure about her timeline to return to play. Horan said she is hopeful that she will be healthy enough to feature in some of Portland’s preseason games at the end of March and represent the national team when it takes on Australia in Colorado, Horan’s home state, on April 4.

Horan is coming off a huge year with the Thorns in the NWSL. She won the 2018 NWSL MVP Award after finishing third in the league with 13 goals and adding two assists in 22 starts and helping to lead the Thorns to the NWSL Championship Game. She also led the league in touches (1,852), duels won (297), aerial duels won (141) and successful passes in the opponent’s half (493). She hopes to build on that performance and help the club claim a trophy this season.

But Horan’s priority this year has to be the World Cup.

Horan and the rest of Portland’s national team players will miss a significant portion of the NWSL season to compete in the World Cup this summer. The Thorns are set to lose at least nine players to the tournament. It is still unclear how many NWSL games those players will miss.

“It’s frustrating,” Horan said. “I love playing for the Thorns. Given our schedules, it’s hard. Obviously, the World Cup is the biggest thing in soccer and that’s what you want to play for and that’s what we’re here to do, but it is unfortunate that we miss so many games.”

U.S. Women’s National Team coach Jill Ellis has yet to name her World Cup roster, but Horan is all but assured a spot on the team.

Prior to her injury, Horan, who has 62 caps with the national team, was earning consistent starts in the midfield and appeared poised to play a big role in France this summer. While Horan is taking nothing for granted, she is expected to regain that starting spot once she returns to full health in the coming weeks.

But Horan is also enjoying her time in Portland at the moment. She said that it will be important that everyone is on the same page in preseason and that the Thorns feel prepared to deal with the absences of their international players this season.

Horan not only hopes to raise a World Cup trophy with the United States in France this summer, but she wants to return to Portland after the tournament and help the Thorns reclaim the NWSL Championship trophy that they won in 2017.

“Obviously, the World Cup is big picture for me right now,” Horan said. “I want to make that roster. That roster has not been named and I can’t sit here and say I’m going to be on that team yet. That’s number one for me. Obviously, I’m also getting healthy right now and looking to get back into training in the next week or so. For the Thorns, I want to give as much as I can to help any of the players here that will be stepping into roles with whoever is gone. We still want to win (the NWSL Championship) and I think we can with the players that we have.”

-- Jamie Goldberg | jgoldberg@oregonian.com

503-853-3761 | @jamiebgoldberg

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