Live from Paris: It's USA versus France in the Quarterfinal

It was hot. The European heatwave continued and the temperature was supposed to be over 90 at game time (that's 32+ for most of the world). The heat, however, did not dampen the enthusiasm of either the American or French fans who had come to see the match of the tournament. While the Americans were certainly invading Paris again, it was not quite as obvious since the French colors are red, white, and blue. Thus, both the streets and the stadium were a cacophony of red, white, and blue, american flags, french flags, glitter, deely boppers, and more.

Anticipating the crowd getting in, we went for the early entrance. The row I thought said O (the letter) was actually 0 (the number). So there we were, not in the front row (that was 00) but one row off the field, level with the 6-yard line of what would turn out to be France's goal for the first half. Yet a new perspective!

 

And, who should appear for warmups? No, we didn't get the USA this time, we got France!

I'm really  quite conflicted about the game. By now, you probably all know the outcome, but it was a pretty tense game to watch. It started out all right -- after all, within the first three minutes of play, Megan Rapinoe converted a free kick from a less than stellar angle into what can only  be described as an unbelievably  awesome and somewhat lucky goal. (Video of this goal, compliments of Vaas.) 

So, that was pretty, but what about the rest of the game? It looked a bit like role reversal to me. The US could not connect on passes, instead, laying them at the feet of the French onslaught. France maintained possession (when have you ever seen a USWNT game where the US struggled to maintain 40% possession).

I can only  imagine how frustrating the game was for France. They did practically everything right -- the maintained possession, they launched threatening attacks up the wings, they placed long balls at the feet of their speedy  forwards, and yet, the one thing they  couldn't do was put the ball in the net. Nope. The USA, who spent a huge fraction of the game defending, which, according to one NYT article, was their game plan all along. And then, in the 65' minute, we saw that flash of USWNT brilliance, with a Tobin Heath cross from the right, finished by Rapinoe, clinching her brace for the night.

The 2-0 lead was whittled back to 2-1 off a gorgeous French set piece that found Wendi Renard (yes, that's the 6'2" Wendi Renard) with a perfect header into the goal. This 2-1 lead made for a very tense 15 minutes with French relentless attacking, the US giving up  too many free kicks for my feeble heart, and a continued possession game for France.

Usually, the game stats support the outcome, but not this time. The US emerged with a victory in a game where France had over 60% possession, with 78% passing accuracy to the USA's 64%, and took 20 shots to the USA's 10. But at the end of the day, perhaps France's 5 shots on goal to the USA's 8 (that's an 80% on-goal percentage for the USA to a 25% on for France) justifies the 2-1 final score.

And we'll end this one with some video footage of the stands, along with the standard game selfie with Vaas Anand (one of our awesome UBC grad students, spending the summer at MPI-SWS in Saarbrucken).

And, in other news, in the first Quarterfinal, England beat Norway 3-0, so next up are the Lionesses on June 2! Stay tuned,