The story of New Zealand’s journey within the Women’s World Cup, and of its exit on Sunday night time, might be a well-recognized one to the crew and its followers: not sufficient objectives for New Zealand, and too many for everybody else.
For New Zealand, a co-host of the match with Australia, the experience had begun on a excessive. The crew had earned its first-ever World Cup victory within the occasion’s opening match, main a rugby-mad nation to stir, if solely momentarily, for ladies’s soccer. For a number of days, even greater achievements appeared doable.
But the opening victory had been slim — the Football Ferns, because the crew is understood, had scored a single purpose — and maybe that was an indication. New Zealand by no means scores a lot, and it by no means scored once more on the World Cup, eradicated quietly on Sunday in Dunedin after a 0-0 tie with Switzerland that was the house crew’s ninth goalless outing in 12 video games this yr.
“Obviously we talked and we were proud of ourselves and what we’ve been able to accomplish, but at the end of the day we wanted to get out of this group stage and we just didn’t,” New Zealand midfielder Malia Steinmetz mentioned. “It’s just black and white.”
In Auckland, in the meantime, Norway was raining objectives on the Philippines, profitable by 6-0 to save lots of what had seemed to be a star-crossed marketing campaign. When the whistles blew to finish each video games, the mathematics was unforgiving for the host nation: Switzerland and Norway had been shifting on, and New Zealand was out.
With that elimination, New Zealand grew to become the primary host ever eradicated within the group stage, a destiny that Australia will attempt to not match in its personal must-win recreation towards Canada on Monday. Not even firm will ease the sting for the Ferns, although.
Norway, alternatively, will really feel resurrected after a cold night time in Auckland. It had not significantly loved the view from final place over the previous week, not when it misplaced to New Zealand in its opener, not when its star Caroline Graham Hansen publicly challenged her coach to revive her to the lineup after which apologized for her outburst, not when the striker Ada Hegerberg sat out once more with an damage.
Faced with the humiliation of going out by the hands of the Philippines, although, one thing stirred within the Norwegians.
Forward Sophie Roman Haug scored on a one-time volley after solely six minutes, then doubled her whole with a header after solely 17. Graham Hansen made it 3-0 earlier than the half, then despatched within the cross that was turned in for a Philippines personal purpose three minutes after halftime.
That silenced a profoundly pro-Philippines crowd of greater than 34,000, and allowed Norway to put aside every week of grumbling and whispers of locker room discontent.
“We felt it was us against the world today and we performed from the very start, delivering when we really had to,” Norway Coach Hege Riise mentioned. “This was the best response we could have given the Norwegian people and ourselves.”
Guro Reiten’s penalty made it 5 after which Roman Haug added her third, and Norway’s sixth, in damage time and that was that. But by then everybody knew it was over anyway, and the one consequence that mattered was the one in Dunedin, the place New Zealand pressed and pressed for the purpose that by no means got here, the prospect to alter a scoreline the Ferns knew completely wouldn’t suffice.
When it didn’t arrive, when the whistle blew for full time, the gamers’ surprised faces advised the story of a match that began brightly and, for them, is now over far too quickly.
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