Crazy Women’s World Cup Quarterfinals!

What crazy, exciting games today and yesterday in the quarterfinals of the women’s world cup! Three of the four games went into overtime and two ended up in penalty kicks.

Japan was amazing in their game against 2 time world champion (and hometown favorite) Germany. Their defense, passing and cohesion was awesome. The goal by their young 18-year-old 5 foot sub Maruyama in overtime was incredible and gave them the much deserved win and advance to the semi-finals for the first time in their history.

http://youtu.be/_Xeb3yD9eZc

Then there was the England and French match, which seemed to go on and on, even though France looked the much better team. When it came down to the penalty kicks however, the Brits fell just short.

To top it off was the U.S. vs. Brazil game today. On average, I’d have said the Brazil team is, in their present form, better than the U.S. and wouldn’t have been surprised to see the U.S. lose. Instead, the U.S. scored in the first few minutes and later had one of their players sent off with a red card for a tackle in the box on Marta. It seemed like a fair call to me, but on the insuing penalty kick, which Hope Solo saved, Brazil was given a second try because of an unbelievable call by the Assistant Referee which said she came off her line. In fact, it is clear she made a totally legal and fantastic save of the ball and the game should have stayed 1-0 for the U.S. On the second try, Marta put it in the back of the net and the score was 1-1.

Then they went into a 30 minute overtime period and Marta scored within the first few minutes, giving Brazil the lead at 2-1. The U.S. was playing a woman down all this time, because of the red card during regular time. So, with only 10 players, compared to Brazil’s 11, the US hung in their until Amy Wambach got on the end of a header just minutes before the end of the extended time, and scored. That took them to penalty kicks.

It was during the penalty kicks that my hero Hope Solo made another save and the U.S. won the game!

Talk about being on the edge of your seat! Regardless of what happens next, I don’t see how the semi-finals on Wednesday or the final can be any more exciting than this weekend, but I’ll definitely be watching.