June 7
Cheers for the home team
Before leaving town for the Japan-Brazil game, images of the U.S. tie with China linger in my mind: a distraught Tiffany Roberts squatting on the field after the game; Carin Gabarra getting through an interview even though it seems to be the last place she wants to be; Mia Hamm setting a stiff upper lip.
The U.S. dropped its first points in seven world championship matches, and the players were in a bit of shock.
Tiffeny Milbrett says that they are just glad they survived and got a tie. Goalie Briana Scurry, on the other hand, was calm, as she always is.
I head to Karlstad with photographer Mike Stahlschmidt to see the Brazil-Japan match. After switching trains we meet up with Arkansas coach Janet Rayfield, who’s scouting Brazil and Japan for the U.S. We’re the first familiar faces she’s seen here.
On hand is FIFA president Joao Havelange. With him is former Japanese Prime Minister Ryuichi Miyazawa. Lobbying for the 2002 World Cup? Both Japan and Korea have signboards promoting their campaigns.
The game is better than expected. Japan plays well, though Brazil, a 1-0 winner over Sweden in the tournament’s opening game, scores first. Japan scores quickly to tie Brazil, which still takes its share of hard fouls. American referee Catherine Hepburn calls some of them and throws some cards — but not enough.
Akemi Noda gets her second goal near halftime. A cross from the right side of the box eludes Brazil keeper Meg’s reach and finds Noda, who breaks Meg’s attempted tackle and dives to head the ball in.
The Brazilians have several chances in the second half. They come when Junko “Rene Higuita” Ozawa leaves her box and gets beat to the ball, but Brazil blows at least two shots at an open net.
Throughout the game, the scoreboard keeps track of the Sweden-Germany match. Most of the Swedes on hand, even those on the support staff, are glum. Sweden, which has already lost one game, is trailing the European champions 2-0.
But the mood gradually swings. There’s some applause when the score flashes 2-1. The applause becomes a loud roar when it’s 2-2. When the 3-2 score finally comes across, almost everyone in the stadium cheers.
June 7
Hamm takes over in goal
Back to Gaevle. Rain pelts us and lightning flashes as we hurry to the hotel, bumping into ESPN’s J.P. Dellacamera and Amy Allmann — the former U.S. keeper who’s doing color commentary for the games. Luckily the storm subsides an hour and a half before the game.
Throughout the last few days, revenge has been on the minds of the U.S. players. They want to bury Denmark, which beat the U.S. 2-0 the last time they met. The U.S. players will have to do it without Michelle Akers, who is out until at least the quarterfinal round with a sprained knee, which now seems worse than the mild concussion she also suffered.
I talk to Roberts’ parents in the stands. Apparently all the players’ parents —
except Sarah Rafanelli’s, who are coming later, and Mia Hamm’s — are here. The Robertses say they are staying at a youth hostel.
Milbrett starts in Akers’ place, as expected. The U.S. gets off to a much better start this time. The frontline comes out with more defensive intensity than against China. Hamm is all over the place, but she gets a yellow card for protesting a foul called on Milbrett.
In the first half, Milbrett, Hamm, Gabarra and Kristine Lilly put the Danes back on their heels. Lilly scores the first goal with a header off a Gabarra corner kick. Milbrett scores four minutes into the second after taking a Hamm through ball and beating the Danish goalie with a shot to the near post. It’s 2-0 for the U.S., which is how the game ends — but not without some anxious moments.
Denmark has its share of chances, but sweeper Carla Overbeck snuffs most of them out, playing magnificently after a mediocre game against China. Joy Fawcett plays well, and Linda Hamilton has a better showing. Scurry, however, doesn’t get the shutout.
She has to share it with Hamm. Scurry gets a red card in the 90th minute for handling the ball outside the box when she punts the ball to the midfield. Some time elapses before the Gambian referee Mamadouba Camara — who has a nightmare of a game — actually calls the foul on the advice of his lineswoman. A foul? Yes. A yellow card? A stretch. A red card? No way.
U.S. coach Tony DiCicco is enraged. He tells the FIFA official on the sideline he wants to see FIFA competition director Walter Gagg then and there to complain about the call. He later files an official protest.
DiCicco has used his three substitutes allowed in the tournament — not two and a goalie as allowed in the 1994 World Cup — so he can’t sub a field player for another goalie.
Who goes over to the sideline and dons Scurry’s jersey and a pair of gloves? Mia Hamm, who gets a big hand from the crowd, which starts to chant her name.
The Danes get a direct free kick from just outside the box — the spot where Scurry committed her offense — but they shoot high and wide. Later, Hamm catches a lobbed shot, much to the delight of the crowd, and then has to smother a ball near the goal line driven from the right side of the box. More applause from the Gaevle crowd.
About an eternity — actually 10 minutes — into stoppage time, Camara finally ends the game.
At the new and improved mixed zone, where reporters mingle with the players and coaches, Hamm says she’s never played goalie before, except in big blowouts as a kid.
Scurry hides her emotions, refusing to say publicly what she thinks of the ref. There’s the appeal to consider.
DiCicco, who ripped the designation of the officiating corps when it was announced by FIFA earlier this year, says Scurry deserved better refereeing
“I saw some fouls maybe on both teams that could have been red card fouls at times,” he says. “To issue a red card on that is just, unfortunately, naive officiating.”
He is asked who will be in goal if Scurry’s appeal is rejected.
“It won’t be Mia,” he says.
June 9
The long trip to Helsingborg
On the road again. This time, the long train ride to Helsingborg in the southwest corner of Sweden, by way of Stockholm.
There are few signs that the Women’s World Cup is being held here, but at the Stockholm station, I do run into some American fans.
The first set is Paloma and her grandparents, from California and New York, respectively. Two out of the three are soccer fans: Paloma is a high school soccer player, and her grandfather is a Soccer America subscriber.
The other American family actually lives in Japan. The father, Jim, works for Proctor & Gamble, and his girls, Monica and Abbie, play soccer in high school.
Photographer Phil Stephens and I get to see most of the Sweden-Japan game at our Helsingborg hotel. The bar area is vacant save for the hotel staff, which is rooting for Sweden in the host’s 2-0 win. Before the game is over, the U.S. women’s delegation shows up and fills up the bar.
Scandinavian Airlines was on strike, so the U.S. team must take the train to Helsingborg. The long ride gives DiCicco a chance to ponder his options for the third game against Australia. The U.S. is in second place, behind China on total goals, and faces the possibility of meeting Sweden or Germany in the quarterfinals if it doesn’t win the group.
Later, at the hotel restaurant, I have to wait half an hour for the “fish of the day.” The American players receive special attention. They get their own specially cooked food — courtesy of their very own chefs, Greg Overbeck, Carla’s husband, and Peter Dorrance, Anson’s brother.
June 10
Keller wins the group for the U.S.
The crowd of 1,105 in the Olympia Stadium looks pitiful in the 16,000-seater stadium.
DiCicco starts Saskia Webber in goal because the appeal of Scurry’s red card does not go through. Milbrett returns in Akers’ absence. DiCicco rests a few players:
Amanda Cromwell moves into Foudy’s position, and Holly Manthei starts in midfield in Tiffany Roberts’ place. Thori Staples starts in the back, pushing Joy Fawcett to the right side of midfield.
DiCicco later says that he was trying to protect Foudy from getting her second yellow card, while Gabarra is hurting — she has been suffering from back spasms since before the China game.
Ever since the U.S. scrimmaged the Aussies in January, DiCicco has been saying they would surprise people here. He was right. They only lost to China 4-2 and they hold the U.S. scoreless at the half.
The U.S. dominates, getting shot after shot. Tisha Venturini has a great chance early, as she fires a Hamm cross off the crossbar from nine yards out. Venturini also has a goal disallowed for a foul on an Australian defender.
On the rare times Australia has the ball in the other half of the field, Angela Iannotta is beating Manthei to the ball and creating for her teammates.
Gabarra comes in for Manthei at the start of the second half, and immediately the U.S. starts to look more cohesive. But it’s not the U.S. that scores first!
Iannotta gets the ball in space and takes it down the left flank. She finds forward Sunni Hughes inside the box, and Hughes takes it deeper and crosses to forward Lisa Casagrande, who heads past Webber. Australia stuns everyone by taking a 1-0 lead in the 54th minute.
The Australians, having already lost their first two games and assumed they would lose to the mighty Americans, were set to leave the next day, but now there’s a chance they could advance to the quarterfinals.
The U.S. has plenty of chances to score in the first half. Lately, though, Hamm hasn’t touched the ball. Converted midfielder Alison Forman now marks Hamm and does a good job. The U.S. frontline is not getting much support from the midfield other than from Fawcett or occasionally Venturini.
In the 63rd minute, Foudy comes in for Cromwell, and the U.S. outlook brightens. Foudy has a lot more energy than in previous games and wins ball after ball in midfield.
Two minutes after she enters the game, Foudy scores the first U.S. goal on a header off a Hamm corner kick. About nine minutes later, Lilly’s shot from the corner of the box ricochets off Aussie keeper Tracey Wheeler to Fawcett at the far post, where the UCLA head coach taps the ball in for a 2-1 U.S. lead.
DiCicco, keeping track of the China-Denmark score, hears that China is up 3-1. He knows a 3-1 U.S. win will not be good enough to win the group, so he urges his players to attack.
After a timeout and two subs, the Aussies lose whatever hold they had on the match. Hamm has her share of dives in this game, but when she goes down in the 88th minute, either on her own or after being tripped by Iannotta, she wins a penalty. Overbeck makes it 3-1.
DiCicco yells, “We need another goal!”
They get it: Hamm outraces the defenders into the right corner of the box and she finds her former Carolina teammate Debbie Keller, who turns and fires the ball past Wheeler into the left corner of the goal. The U.S. wins 4-1 and takes the group.
Keller, who had run back to the hotel before the mixed zone interviews to go jogging with teammates Sarah Rafanelli and Jen Lalor, has to be called back.
Keller may be the Cinderella story of the U.S. team. She wasn’t on the travel roster for the international trips to Portugal or France. She had trained with the U.S. in Florida and, by all accounts, was a hard worker, but not many expected her to make the roster. She says she was surprised to be named to the World Cup team and was planning on going to the World Cup as a spectator. She and her mother had already bought game tickets.
June 11
The Olympic eight
Back to Gaevle, where the U.S. will play Japan in a quarterfinal in two days. Along the train trip from Gothenburg to Stockholm I see hundreds of lush green fields. Many of them are dotted with soccer fields and Sunday afternoon kids’ games.
FIFA announces the final eight for the Olympics. Actually, there was some confusion. The Women’s World Championship serves as the qualifying tournament for the first Olympic women’ soccer tournament next summer. And the top eight go through — technically, the host U.S. and the top seven other finishers. England is one of the quarterfinalists, but it’s not eligible for the Olympics. After first saying it would rank the 12 teams at the conclusion of the tournament, FIFA announces that Brazil, with three points by virtue of its upset over Sweden, is the best of the teams already eliminated and will join the United States and the other six quarterfinalists next summer.
June 12
Akers is saving right leg
I arrive at the U.S. practice field early. It’s 10:00 a.m., but the team doesn’t get there for another 15 minutes. While Sports Illustrated’s Kelly Whiteside and I wait, we meet Carrie Serwetnyk.
Carrie is a former UNC Tar Heel and former Canadian national team player. She’s also former member of the Yomiuri Beleza club in Japan and is covering the tournament for the Toronto Star, though she’s writing less now that Canada is out after a disappointing tournament.
Akers looks okay running, though she’s wearing a big blue knee brace on her right knee. When it comes to the shooting drills, she shoots everything with her left leg. Later, she says she’s saving the right for the game. DiCicco says that, if she does play, she probably won’t start. The rest of the team looks loose.
by Soccer America Associate Editor Dean Caparaz
Report Cards
USA 2, Denmark 0
USA — Scurry (5), Overbeck (7), Fawcett (7), Hamilton (5), Foudy (6), Venturini (5), Lilly (7), Roberts (6), Milbrett (6), Gabarra (5), Hamm (8). Substitutions: Staples (5) for Hamilton (66th minute), Keller (6) for Milbrett (73rd), Rafanelli (-)for Gabarra (86th).
Denmark — Larsen (4), Flaeng (4), Terp (4), K.Pederson (4), Holm (5), Laursen (6), Jensen (7), Christensen (5), Nielsen (5), Krogh (6), Madsen (4). Substitutions: Axelsen (4) for Larsen (46th minute), Hansen (5) for Krogh (66th minute), Petersen (5) for Madsen (73rd).