The U.S. women's soccer team defeated Canada 4-3 in an extra-time thriller that is bound for the history books.
Despite trailing the Canadians in the first half, the U.S. team held on and forced the game into extra time, where several failed attempts on both sides culminated in a last-minute header by Alex Morgan that sailed narrowly over the hand of Canadian goalkeeper Erin McLeod.
The United States will contend for a gold medal Thursday against the Japanese, who defeated the French team 2-1 in the other semifinal match.
The gold-medal match will be a chance for revenge for the Americans, just one year after Japan beat them 3-1 in the 2011 World Cup final.In the 123rd minute, Morgan nodded a cross from Heather O'Reilly into the back of the net to produce the first U.S. lead of the match. Having rallied from deficits all night long at Old Trafford in Manchester, the U.S. women are moving on to face Japan after a thrilling 4-3 win. It took until the second half for the game to completely set alight, and Team USA scored straight from a Megan Rapinoe corner to equalize. Christine Sinclair made it 2-1 to Canada soon after, before Rapinoe equalized again.
Sinclair completed her hat-trick to make it 3-2 before Wambach equalized a third time from the penalty spot.
So it went to extra time and a fiercely competed two periods looked to be heading for penalties before Morgan stepped forward to book Team USA's place in the final and break Canadian hearts.
No comments:
Post a Comment