FIFA Women's World Cup 2015

The Game Room
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The Women’s World Cup starts on Saturday in Canada. This thread can be for general discussions as well as specific game commentary. (Do not read this thread if you are going to be watching a game time-shifted, as should be obvious.)
Groups (along with each team’s current ranking):

Group A:
Canada (tie-8)
China (16)
New Zealand (17)
Netherlands (12)

Group B:
Germany (1)
Ivory Coast (<50)
Norway (11)
Thailand (29)

Group C:
Japan (4)
Switzerland (19)
Cameroon (<50)
Ecuador (48)

Group D:
USA (2)
Australia (10)
Sweden (5)
Nigeria (33)

Group E:
Brazil (7)
South Korea (18)
Spain (14)
Costa Rica (37)

Group F:
France (3)
England (6)
Colombia (28)
Mexico (25)
First match for team USA is vs Australia on Monday.

General thoughts:
-Of course the USA is in the group of death. We’re always in the group of death. Three teams in the top 10.
-The field is expanded to 24 teams, which is nice in a world-participation sense, but means that some of the 3rd place teams from groups make it through to the round of 16, which makes the group stages even less interesting. The pool of talented teams is getting larger (as proven by South Korea holding the USA to a scoreless draw in their sendoff match) but there are still plenty of teams which have no real chance of competing with the powerhouses.
-There’s a good deal of anger over the fact that the games will be played on artificial turf rather than real grass… many of the players view that as additional evidence that the women’s game is basically second class in FIFA’s mind

Any other storylines to be following?

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I always thought the artificial turf argument got a bit silly when people were saying things like men would never play on artificial turf - you know, aside from a number of MLS teams. If you limit your concerns to artificial turf wouldn’t be used for a Men’s World Cup maybe you’d get somewhere, but to expand to the men’s game all over got a bit silly (I think some Scandinavian leagues also have turf fields). I also think it actually won’t be terribly long before turf is allowable for the Men’s WC as well - the quality of the stuff is getting better and better.

Anyways, aside from that, the USWMT has a great chance in this tourney (it’s almost a home tourney), but I hope people don’t get surprised if the US crashes out against Germany or France. The US isn’t dominant over the women’s game as it used to be. Also depending on how healthy Alex Morgan is (It doesn’t really look that great), it may be difficult to score.

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Well, given that the US hasn’t won the tournament for 16 years, it would be a bit silly to say that we’ve been dominant and that it would be shocking for us to lose.

I actually think the US Women’s Soccer Team is the perfect team to root for… very very good so they’re always competitive, but not so dominantly good that anything can ever be taken for granted.

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Oh believe me, plenty of casual American soccer fans are shocked when I let them know that it wouldn’t be terribly surprising if we lost.

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I watched the final friendly against South Korea, and while the Koreans were good, the USA was awful. Their passing was awful (passing behind advancing players, sending ball after ball out of bounds) and their good goal scoring chances rarely were on net. They really need Alex Morgan back.

If SK had even a decent front line, it would have been 3-0.

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What gave you that impression? The fact that the 1991 World Cup was played with 40-minute halves because “women don’t have the stamina for 45” (and even when they did make it 45 in 1995, each team could call a 2-minute (IIRC) time out during a break in play)?
Or how ESPN didn’t show the 1995 final live, choosing instead to show the 3rd-place match from two days earlier because that’s the one USA was in? (At least that was an improvement from the 1991 coverage, where they didn’t even have video highlights of the final until the day after the final.)
Or perhaps the stories about how, in 2003 and 2007, most fans in Germany didn’t care about it even as the Germans were winning the Cup both times?
Or, speaking of 2007, the stories about the parking lot at the 2007 final being filled with people (usually mothers and their soccer-playing daughters) trying to sell tickets (at or below face value, mind you - while ticket scalping is legal in California, you can’t charge more than face value at the site itself) because USA wasn’t in it?

I wonder what caused the “swing.” I have heard that, back in the early 1990s, countries like Mexico had problems getting women to play as there was a general mentality among men that “if you let your girlfriend play soccer, then turn in your man card.” I also wonder how strongly American universities have been trying to give soccer scholarships overseas women; movies like Bend It Like Beckham couldn’t have hurt, although I wonder how the main character’s family would have felt when they discovered that Santa Clara University is a Jesuit school.

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The US has finished 1, 3, 1, 3, 3, 2 in the past world cups. I’d say a worst finish of 3rd is pretty dominant.

I’m not sure how well the US will do this year. The hope is that they will get better as the tournament progresses because they don’t look all that great right now. Their defense appears to be better than 4 years ago, which is good. The offense seems to lack the ability to finish, though they create lots of opportunities. They’re in a pretty tough group, but the top 3 should qualify out of that group.

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By the way, here are current odds to win the WC. (Not sure what the second set of numbers for all teams other than USA mean):

ODDS TO WIN 2015 FIFA WOMEN’S WORLD CUP, JUNE 6 – JULY 5, 2015
USA 5/2
GERMANY 3/1 (4/1)
BRAZIL 7/1 (5/1)
FRANCE 7/1 (12/1)
JAPAN 8/1 (7/1)
SWEDEN 12/1 (10/1)
CANADA 12/1
ENGLAND 25/1 (20/1)
NORWAY 30/1
AUSTRALIA 50/1 (40/1)
SPAIN 60/1 (40/1)
CHINA 60/1
NETHERLANDS 60/1
SOUTH KOREA 60/1
SWITZERLAND 80/1 (75/1)
MEXICO 150/1
NEW ZEALAND 150/1
COLOMBIA 150/1
NIGERIA 200/1 (150/1)
COSTA RICA 500/1 (250/1)
ECUADOR 500/1 (250/1)
IVORY COAST 500/1 (250/1)
CAMEROON 500/1 (300/1)
THAILAND 1000/1 (300/1)

Bet it all on Thailand!

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Well, day 1 was fairly uneventful. China nearly held hosts Canada to a fairly boring scoreless draw before giving up a (correctly called) PK (which as magnificently taken). I didn’t watch Netherlands vs New Zealand, the Dutch won 1-0 off a fanstastic goal.

Day 2 looks to be one of the least exciting of the whole tournament. Any result other than Germany and Norway with 3 points and Thailand and Ivory Coast with 0 will be absolutely stunning.

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The Germany-Ivory Coast game is a joke. 5-0 at the half, 7-0 with 20 minutes to go, and the Germans even let up this half. It’s the kind of game that makes you wish international soccer had a skunk rule.

EDIT: Make that 8-0. Jesus.

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Nine.

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Seems that the Germans found how to pass the goal machine from the men’s team to the ladies. :slight_smile:

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Ten.
We will see what happens when they play somewhat better opposition…

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All those rough tackles from CIV made my knees hurt, just from watching.

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The first two games I watched today… :cool:

Just watched 2 women’s World Cup soccer matches.

Two games, 6 teams Norway vs Thailand, Referees
Two games, 6 teams Germany vs Thailand, Referees

First, Norway vs Thailand, With New Zealand refs.

Norway was the winner as they should have been, they are one of the top teams. ( big, strong, fast, talented with much experience at this level. )

Thailand is way down the list, 47th or something. ( small players with much less talent playing in their first world cup. ) They did surprisingly well, even though they lost.

Game #2 was Germany, rated #1 against Gold Coast rated 67th or something. Germany did win as they should.

Score was 10 to zero. The refs were from Canada. IMO, they were an embarrassment to this ex referee. The Gold Coast got 8-10 yellow cards, Germany got 1. The near side lines person was OK, did a nice job. The off side lines person destroyed the GC team in the first 10 minutes. IMO, all but one ball out of play and that team should throw it in was correct. Everything else, she might as well strayed back at the hotel. GC were hosed from minute one and they knew it. Off sides, fouls, etc. Was very bad and I understood their frustration. Most kept their cool for the most part. Then the main referee started playing. Germany could do no wrong & GC could do no right. As I said, yellow cards. This was the GC’s first time in a World Cup and got to play only one friendly before going to the World Cup.The near side lines person was OK, did a nice job. The off side lines person destroyed the GC. It worked, the GC lost their cool.

The announcers were under some mandate because they said nothing about what was obvious. The guy was biased, plain & simple. Germany , Germany, Germany. The ex-player, female doing the color was pretty good but as most players, had player ideas about the laws of the game. OK, I understand that… The Refs should know and see the easy ones. The production guys were really good, all the really bad calls, off sides not withstanding cut every official’s bad mistake so the audience could not see them.

I ruined my chair with the steam coming out of my ears… I was so embarrassed… The US plays tomorrow evening and the rumor is they are off their game some. ::: GAH !!! :::: In all ways, women’s soccer is getting better & better.

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Well, that certainly is an…opinion!

Not how I saw it, btw.

Two things: one, it was Ivory Coast, not Gold Coast, and two, there is already a thread about the WWC in the Game Room.

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GusNSpot, I’ve merged your thread with the existing thread on the same topic. Sports-related threads generally belong in the Game Room forum.

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Nor I. What I saw was an inexperienced team from a region that doesn’t have any history of women’s sports, let alone soccer, being run over by a team from a country that has embraced soccer wholeheartedly. To put it in American terms, it was like a high school football team against the Steelers. There was no number of “good” calls that could have made that game competitive.

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The Germany v Ivory Coast game was just embarrassing.

The game isn’t helped by having a team of that ineptitude playing on the world stage.

As for the refereeing? certainly there we several dodgy decisions where penalties were due to Germany and the Ivorian player should have been sent off. I didn’t see bias for the Germans, I saw pity for the Ivorians.

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It’s more likely that you don’t fully understand the laws of the game.

As Novelty Bobble mentioned, this was just a case of a high school calibre team playing a world-class team.