Two-time World Cup titlists the United States and reigning champion Germany are sure to be the hot favorites for the trophy of the fifth FIFA Women's World Cup in China, which will run from Sept. 10 to 30.
As the most decorated team in the women's soccer history, the United States were crowned at the first World Cup in China in 1991, the third World Cup on home soil in 1999, the Atlanta and the Athens Olympics. They were also the all-time champions of CONCACAF.
Aside from the titles, the United States were the only team to settle in the top three of all four previous World Cup events.
They finished third in 1995 and 2003.
In the World Cup history, the United States still lead the all-time rankings for matches played, wins and goals scored. They played the maximum six matches in each of the four World Cup events with 20 wins, two draws, two defeats, 73 goals for and 18 against.
In the CONCACAF championships history, the United States won every match since 1991.
The remarkable Kristine Lilly, a 36-year-old veteran, is still one of the best players in the world. She is the only woman who appears in all the World Cup events and only two men can match her record: Mexico's Antonio Carbajal from 1950 to 1966 and Germany's Lothar Matthaus from 1982 to 1998.
With around 120 goals in her over 300 international caps,
Lilly is still the leading striker of the United States. But the most frightful factor of the team is that Lilly is not the only competitive player.
She gets strong support from a new generation of talents, such as striker Abby Wambach, who now has an astonishing goals-to-games ratio for the United States, and midfielder Shannon Boxx, whose battling in the middle and aerial threat up front on set-pieces can make all the difference.
The satisfactory transition of the U.S. team should be attributed to coach Greg Ryan, a former professional standout in the now-defunct North American Soccer League. He took over the team in early 2005 and has taken the squad from strength to strength. Undefeated in his first 26 games in charge, Ryan led the Americans to an Algarve Cup title, a Peace Queen Cup championship in South Korea and a CONCACAF Championship on home soil.
Technically, tactically and physically strong, the United States are a team from which it is not easy to find any weak points. Although, in a sense, this is the most inexperienced U.S. World Cup roster since the first, the team has been together for three years and its only loss under Ryan was in penalty kicks to Germany back in March 2006.
Germany, which look to have the same technical, tactical and physical strength with the United States, will no doubt try to retain the title in China.
Crushing the Americans 3-0 in the semifinal of the 2003 World Cup was and is a strong boost for the Germans who won all their eight World Cup qualifiers to reach the 2007 tournament in China, collecting 31 goals with top scorer and two-time FIFA Women's World Player of the Year, Birgit Prinz, bagging eight.
Germany also qualified for all the World Cup finals and had an impressive record. They finished fourth in China 1991, runners-up in Sweden 1995, quarter finalists in USA 1999 before finally winning the world title in the United States four years later.
Also seeing through a transition period in recent years, Germany now have looked better and stronger than ever before, with top striker Birgit Prinz, world class midfielder Renate Lingor and defender Kerstin Stegemann with over 150 caps.
The German team was hampered by injuries earlier this year, and goalkeeper Silke Rottenberg's injury could be trouble heading into the tournament, but they've been without her long enough to try to get Nadine Angerer ready in goal. But nothing has changed in the team's solid physical play with tactical precision and all-out effort for the full 90 and beyond, which is a traditional brand of the German soccer.
Furthermore, Germany were drawn into the easiest-looking group A with England, Argentina and Japan. Unfortunately, the United States have to fight with Sweden, the runners-up of 2003 World Cup, DPR Korea, the two-time Asian champions and the Doha Asiad titlists, and Nigeria, who have long dominated the African arena, in group B which is described as Group of Death.
If both the United States and Germany top their respective groups , they will not meet before the final on Sept. 30 in Shanghai. But should one of them finish first and the other second in group play, they would clash in the quarter-finals.
However, a World Cup jinx is that no team has ever successfully defended a title.
Source: Xinhua
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