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Join Tomorrow Morning for Arg./Brazil Game Posts, U.S. Women Advance To Final
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I know most soccer fanatics such as myself will be up nice and early (the middle of the morning for us West Coasters) to watch the Olympic semifinals for men’s soccer. As I mentioned yesterday, Nigeria/Belgium is at 6 a.m. ET, while the much-anticipated Brazil/Argentina battle will be at 9 a.m. ET. For those of you who will be up checking out the epic Ronaldinho/Messi battle to reach the gold-medal game, I’m going to be posting throughout the game with the hope that we’ll get some people on to talk about the games a little bit. There will be more frequent posts for the Brazil game, simply because I’ll be more awake a 6 a.m. than 3 a.m. Come join. We’ll be the only idiots up at that hour anyway, so you might as well have some company.
U.S. Women advance to final
But on to the U.S. women’s team in Beijing, where they defeated Japan 4-2 on Monday to advance to the gold-medal game. The goals came from Angela Hucles (2), Lori Chalupny and Heather O’Reilly.
For those who haven’t watched the U.S. before, these girls can play. I have some first-hand experience with this particular group, as O’Reiily and Chalupny both played at the University of North Carolina (my school), and they got well-deserved large crowds because their games were so fast and entertaining. For those who don’t know, UNC and head coach Anson Dorrance have ruled NCAA women’s soccer for almost its entire history– in fact, current UNC player Tobin Heath is on this Olympic squad.
Hucles’ second goal gave the U.S. a 4-1 lead, and they conceded the final Japanese score in the 90th minute. After dropping their opening group game against Norway 2-0, the Americans have come back strong despite playing for the entire tournament without star forward Abby Wambach (broken leg).
And the win also sets up a U.S.-Brazil gold-medal final. Brazil knocked the U.S. out in the World Cup finals in 2007, a game the U.S. would just as soon forget. They lost 4-0 and went through a well-publicized spat when goalie Hope Solo was replaced by veteran Brianna Scurry before the game and proceeded to criticize the decision afterwards. Now Solo should have her chance to shine.
The Americans beat Brazil back in the 2004 Olympic gold-medal game. The final is set for 9 p.m. ET on Thursday.
