The United States won a record-extending fourth women’s World Cup with a 2-0 victory over the Netherlands on Sunday as second-half goals from Megan Rapinoe and Rose Lavelle confirmed their status as the leading power in the women’s game.<\/p>\n
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The defending champions struggled to gain dominance for an hour before a Rapinoe penalty, her sixth goal of the tournament, broke the deadlock and then a fine individual effort from Lavelle in the 69th minute put the outcome beyond doubt.<\/p>\n
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Rapinoe, whose outspoken views have been so prominent throughout these finals, returned to the starting lineup after sitting out the semi-final win over England.<\/p>\n
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Her place in the side came at the expense of Christen Press while Dutch left-winger Lieke Martens was fit to play for the European champions after overcoming a toe injury.<\/p>\n
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Football – Women’s World Cup Final – United States v Netherlands – Groupama Stadium, Lyon, France – July 7, 2019 Allie Long of the US celebrates winning the Women’s World Cup with Jessica McDonald, Alex Morgan and Carli Lloyd at the end of the match. Reuters<\/p>\n
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The Dutch made an aggressive start, with some strong challenges and midfielder Sherida Spitse picked up a booking in the 10th minute for a lunging challenge on Lavelle.<\/p>\n
The US, who had scored in the opening 12 minutes of every previous game at this tournament, were struggling to settle as the Dutch harried and closed them down quickly.<\/p>\n
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The Netherlands looked to hit the Americans on the counter-attack and that approach almost bore fruit in the 26th minute when Vivianne Miedema released Lineth Beerensteyn through the middle but US keeper Alyssa Naeher was alert.<\/p>\n
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However, as the half wore on, the US gradually gained the upper hand and Dutch keeper Sari van Veenendaal did well to parry a fierce first-time drive by Julie Ertz in the 28th.<\/p>\n
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Then Alex Morgan turned a low cross from Rapinoe goalwards and Van Veenendaal tipped the ball against the post before safely gathering it.<\/p>\n
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The pressure was mounting as Morgan brought the Dutch keeper into action again with a fine shot on the turn in the 40th.<\/p>\n
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US defender Kelley O’Hara had to be substituted at halftime, following a clash of heads with Martens, and Ali Krieger came on at right-back.<\/p>\n
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Football – Women’s World Cup Final – United States v Netherlands – Groupama Stadium, Lyon, France – July 7, 2019 Megan Rapinoe of the US celebrates winning the women’s world cup. Reuters<\/p>\n
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VAR PENALTY<\/p>\n
Encouraged by their first half resilience, the Dutch stuck with the same tenacious approach after the break but their aggression proved to be their downfall.<\/p>\n
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Stefanie van der Gragt’s foot caught Morgan’s upper arm after a high challenge in the box and the American fell to the ground. After initially awarding a corner, the French referee turned to the video review and then gave a penalty.<\/p>\n
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Rapinoe took the responsibility and coolly slotted the ball past the almost stationary Van Veenendaal to bring to life the large American contingent in the capacity crowd of 57,900.<\/p>\n
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Suddenly the US were more relaxed and the Dutch appeared to lose not only their cohesion but also their energy.<\/p>\n
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Perhaps sensing that dip, Lavelle took the game directly to the Dutch – bursting out of midfield towards the heart of the defence and dropping her shoulder to the left before unleashing a sweet shot into the bottom corner to make it 2-0.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The United States won a record-extending fourth women’s World Cup with a 2-0 victory over the Netherlands on Sunday as second-half goals from Megan Rapinoe and Rose Lavelle confirmed their status as the leading power in the women’s game. The defending champions struggled to gain dominance for an hour before a Rapinoe penalty, her sixth goal of the tournament, broke the deadlock and then a fine individual effort from Lavelle in the 69th minute put the outcome beyond doubt. Rapinoe, whose outspoken views have been so prominent throughout<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":18886,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[30,7],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18885"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18885"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18885\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18887,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18885\/revisions\/18887"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/18886"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18885"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18885"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.banglanewsus.com\/english\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18885"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}