Australia, China earn crucial 1-goal wins
A stunning display presented itself in Montpellier. Brazil and Australia gave us the most exciting match — so far — of the second round of the Women’s World Cup group stage. It was a high-scoring game featuring an impressive comeback, and with two new records broken.
In their first match, Brazil demonstrated difficulty distributing the ball when high pressure was applied. Jamaica exposed the Canarinha’s first-line mistakes when they decided to push forward, an action that Australia started doing at the beginning of the match. But Brazil opened the scoring with a penalty converted by Marta, her 16th goal in World Cups. She joined Miroslav Klose as the top scorer in World Cup tournaments — among men and women — and became the first player in football to convert in five different World Cups.
Cristiane expanded the difference by sending a header to the back of the net, culminating a marvelous play. But Australia got back in the game before the half after a second play that Caitlin Foord finished in front of the goal.
Brazil wasn’t as superior as the score showed. The Aussies tried; they generated opportunities. They nullified Marta and disintegrated the chemistry of Brazil’s midfield. In the first 21 minutes of the second half, Australia inflicted enough damage to Brazil’s operation to flip the score from 2-1 down to 3-2 up.
The Aussies ended Brazil’s 16-game unbeaten group stage streak. Since 1995, the Canarinha hadn’t lost a first-round World Cup match. With Australia’s crucial victory, Group C is even unless Italy makes a statement in its game against Jamaica.
China’s first task was a difficult one. A close match against Germany that ended in a loss left China with a low margin for error in a very even group. The Asian squad had a very decent performance against Germany. They generated enough options to tie the game, but the goal didn’t arrive.
However, they settled in against South Africa, even if they took 130 minutes to end the frustration of not finding the back of the net. Li Ying scored the only goal of the match after anticipating the goalkeeper on a cross. The final score didn’t reflect China’s enjoyable football and good number of offensive opportunities.
Down a goal, South Africa couldn’t move the ball beyond the middle third of the pitch. From time to time, they tried to take advantage on counters, but the Chinese defensive line acted impeccably. The African squad incrementally improved its ball possession by the end of the game, but never caused any danger in the goal defended by Peng Shimeng.
China will face Spain in the last match of the group stage. Both have considerable possibilities to advance to the next round as second and third place. Although, China needs to find that final touch against another hard European adversary in Spain if they want to fight for a less difficult path in the 2019 World Cup tournament.
Follow Luis on Twitter: @LFulloa.
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