In the first of two meetings with its South American opposition, the U.S. Women’s National Team defeated Colombia, 7-0, at Rentschler Field on Wednesday evening.
Crystal Dunn pounced on a defensive mistake in the 27th minute, stealing the ball inside the Colombia penalty area and then slotting her shot past goalkeeper Catalina Perez.
The U.S. doubled its lead five minutes later, when midfielder Allie Long scored her first national team goal off of a header. Mallory Pugh scored the game’s third goal in the 33rd minute after Carli Lloyd assisted on her second sequence of the evening.
Prior to halftime, the USWNT tacked on its fourth goal by way of Lloyd. Pugh used her speed down the left wing and delivered a low cross into the path of Lloyd, who comfortably one-timed her shot past Perez.
Tobin Heath put her stamp on the match for the U.S. in the 62nd minute, before Long doubled her account just minutes later.
Second half substitute Christen Press notched the Americans’ seventh goal with over a quarter hour remaining, as Dunn recorded her second assist of the night.
Long almost opened the scoring for the USWNT in brilliant fashion after 12 minutes, striking a shot off the crossbar from outside the box.
Colombia managed its first shot on goal in the 20th minute, when Diana Ospina tested goalkeeper Hope Solo from distance. The low-traveling shot was comfortably handled by Solo on the goal line.
Overall, the U.S. outshot Colombia 20 to six, although the Americans recorded half of those efforts on target. Solo was rarely tested on the night, making two saves from the Colombia attack.
The U.S. and Colombia will meet again at Talen Energy Stadium in Chester, Pennsylvania on April 10.
WOMAN OF THE MATCH
While Carli Lloyd had herself a productive opening 45 minutes, Allie Long put pressure on head coach Jill Ellis to bring her to this summer’s Olympic Games in Rio de Janeiro. The Portland Thorns attacker paced the U.S. with two goals, one in each half.
MOMENT OF THE MATCH
Any of the four first-half goals were worthy, but Crystal Dunn‘s finish before the half-hour mark opened the floodgates for the USWNT.
MATCH TO FORGET
Colombia goalkeeper Catalina Perez faced 10 shots on target against the U.S., seven of which ended up in the back of the net. Surely wasn’t the type of outing the shot-stopper was hoping to encounter.
Send this team to Copa America
What I saw in this game was better player assignments than Jill has as her first choices and that bothers me. Crystal Dunn should be starting as some form of center forward. She is better than Lloyd or Morgan at that position. She is better with the ball than either and fights for everything. . Will she win the start based on her performance? doubt it. Ellis is as bone headed as JK is on the Men’s side. . Point two… Where has Long been. She was immense and yet apparently far from the Ellis favored list. If we’re going to play two DM, she needs to be one of them. Will it happen? most likely not.
Finally… 15 minutes for Press in a game won 7 -0. Unless she starts on Saturday, this was hardly fair.
Ellis has been given the most talented team in the World and told…”don’t screw it up.” It’s all she can do not to screw it up. When she starts “others” we look better than we do when she starts her starters. Same with JK. It’s like she has to put her mark on player selection rather than let people win positions.
I’d still like to know why she sent that kid home? She could be the next big thing
Wow, that’s a lot of complaints given what this team has accomplished over the past year!
Ellis has certainly stuck with her core group as every manager tends to do not just Klinnsman, but to say she’s better than Footballer of the Year Carli Lloyd is a bit of a stretch and let’s wait on Long it was one game against Colombia in freezing temperatures. I am glad we are finally seeing some new faces, thought it was a bad idea that Box, Rampone, and Wambach were all on last years world cup roster just to get them a title when they provided little on field help.
Have you watched Carly since the WWC? Ellis could pull her off the field at any point and we wouldnt even miss her. I think shes on the back side of the hill I think
Buster: Honestly, no since almost every game is against a bunch of 18-20 year old girls from the Caribbean and in the other night’s case South America. I did look up she’s scored 17 goals since the World Cup, but again the competition she scored against was very weak and five were penalty kicks.
It’s like a NBA team against a high school team. Boring
Or UConn women’s hoops vs any women’s BB team
More like UConn wbb. Yes they are leagues above the rest but they have created that league. Love watching perfection.
The USWNT is using these matches correctly to find combinations which work. I wish there were more before Rio. In this one the U S spread the field and when Columbia spread their defense to
cover, the U. S. was able to go through the middle. I see the U.S. being able to handle most of
the teams at Rio, but will be tested against the bigger more physical teams like Germany, Sweden,
Canada & France. Also, I didn’t see a couple of Columbia’s top guns from the WC in this match.
Not sure if they are still around or have retired. Anyway, the weather may have been to the U. S.
benefit here. We will see if they can match this effort on Sunday.
Colombia hadn’t played a match since the World Cup. The U.S has played like 20 games (all at home, BTW…gotta generate that revenue!)…No surprise this was a different story than in Canada.
Finally! Someone can beat Colombia!
Err…. this joke would work a lot better if Colombia wasn’t among the tiny group of countries we actually have a surprisingly strong track record against