France v USA: Women's World Cup quarter-final – live!

Speaking of penalty controversies, today’s officials are …

The first was rather obvious, wasn’t it?

Anyway, tonight’s people in green are …

Referee: Kateryna MONZUL (UKR)
AR1: Marina STRILETSKA (UKR)
AR2: Oleksandra ARDASHEVA (UKR)
FO: Kate JAZEWICZ (AUS)
Reserve AR: KIM Kyoung Min (KOR)
VAR: Danny MAKKELIE (NED)

A few more of your pregame thoughts before I go into full-bore game mode. I mean full-blown. Hopefully not full bore.

alincoln on Twitter, presumably referring to Horan’s omission from the starting XI: “Remember when Greg Ryan started Scurry over Solo against Brazil in 2007 WC?This is Ellis’ Greg Ryan moment and will also be her last game as HC of the USWNT.”

Was there an off-field issue with Horan?

Joe Pearson has already has wine. I’m on my third soda, which I never do. I don’t think caffeine affects me, though — hey, should I rewire the entertainment center while I watch? I think I’ll also juggle.

Julian Borrill: “Red, white, blue – US … Bleu, blanc, rouge – France”

Je parle francais un peu, mais ma vocabulaire est tres mal. I’m the product of US schools. You’re all lucky I can speak English.

Peter Oh: “I like the sound of “the Statue of Liberty derby”. Hopefully this match will be remembered only for the actions of the ladies on the pitch, and I’m not talking about the referees. No VARc de Triomphe, please!”

Actually, I heard they checked the video again, and they’ve taken back the penalty awarded on the Lavelle we-won’t-say-dive incident against Spain. We’ll have to play the rest of that game again.

Anthems are underway, and France has the USA beaten there.

Pregame scenes

As ever, I’m astounded at the disposable income Americans can conjure for things like this. I can’t even afford to see my alma mater play basketball, but I made poor career choices. “Poor” as in financial. This is clearly its own reward.

Speaking of the red, white and blue, we have this from the mailbag from Jamison MacLachlan …

“The one HUGE Achilles Heel the US has is that they seem to have an inability to either recognize they need to make adjustments in game or they refuse to. … If the US plays the way they did against Spain….lacking awareness and creativity in adjusting on both sides of the ball….it could be a long night for my red white and blue.”

Which red, white and blue, though?

Speaking of the seven European teams in the last eight, Shane Hart asks a question of all England fans: Who do you want to win?

Red, white and blue!

I lost the tweet that referred to this game as the Statue of Liberty matchup. At least we’re remembering that wonderful celebration of democratic ideals and not selling “freedom fries” any more.

From our correspondent on the scene …

Brandon Dwonch, in the inbox: “I have not looked towards to a game this much since the Champions League Final.” But he says it’ll be goalless, and France will win 4-3 in PKs. (Or, as we pedants call it, kicks from the mark.)

Worth noting — the USA didn’t have a lot of shots on goal in the game against Spain. To be precise, three, including the two penalties.

Also on the interwebs …

Predictions

I picked the USA to win it all before we started, and I’m sticking with it. I also picked Australia to reach the final, so I may not be good at this.

Today, I’m thinking if the US women score the first goal, it’s all but over. The French have a word for how that will feel — Déjà vu.

The host country has had a good team throughout the 2010s, but medals have been elusive. In 2011, two late goals by Abby Wambach and Alex Morgan pushed the US to a 3-1 win in the semifinals. They’ve never been closer to the top three than that.

Controversy No. 3: The heat

Tom Lutz informs me that, contrary to what I said previously, our sun cannot go supernova.

That will be of little comfort in France, which just saw a record temperature of 45.9C. That’s nearly 115 degrees in US temperatures. Or, as we sometimes call it, Death Valley hot.

Unchanged from the last game.

And it’s pretty much as projected from our team guide.

AKA Controversy No. 2: Lindsey Horan’s omission

Lindsey Horan is a tremendous two-way midfielder. She has experience playing with an against the French players. She sat out the round of 16 game against Spain until the very end, perhaps because she was carrying a yellow card, and a second would put her out of action for the game against France.

As it turns out, that didn’t matter. Out of the four main US midfielders — Horan, defensive destroyer / attacker Julie Ertz, two-way player Samantha Mewis, and playmaker Rose Lavelle — Horan is the one that sits.

Another option Jill Ellis would have had — sit Becky Sauerbrunn, one of the finest defenders in women’s soccer’s relatively brief history but coming off some minor injury concerns and a major mistake against Spain, to move Ertz to center back. Didn’t do that.

It’s the familiar lineup at the back: Alyssa Naeher in goal, Sauerbrunn and Abby Dahlkemper at center back, attack-minded Crystal Dunn at left back, attack-minded Kelley O’Hara at right back, Ertz behind Mewis and Lavelle in the middle, Megan Rapinoe trying to do better on the left flank than she did against Spain, Tobin Heath trying to see more of the ball on the right than she did against Spain, and Alex Morgan trying to be fouled out of the play a lot less than she did against Spain.

Personally, I’d put Dunn at forward in place of Rapinoe, and I’d go back in time to include Casey Short on the roster so she could play left back.

Controversy No. 1: Equal pay

Please check out the work Caitlin Murray and Sam Morris did with respect to the comparative World Cup bonuses that the US women might achieve in the next 10 days and the US men might achieve before the sun goes supernova.

The tough part is that FIFA’s bonuses are pretty far from equal. In 2018, France got $38 million. This year, the winner will get $4 million.

So your options are these …

It’s Brazil-Germany in the men’s World Cup. It’s Ronda Rousey vs. Cris Cyborg, had Rousey stuck with MMA and gone back up to her old weight class. It’s Kelly Clarkson vs. Susan Boyle in an all-star battle of reality-contest singers.

It’s big. Grande. Incroyable.

Super Bowls are hyped for two weeks. This game has been hyped since the World Cup draw was made in December, assuming the USA and France would win their groups and their eighth-final games. (As it turns out, each team made hard work of it.)

So this could be a contest of titanic proportions.

Or it could be Mike Tyson knocking out Michael Spinks in 91 seconds. But let’s hope not.

The winner faces England, which will be the next epic match.

Beau will be here shortly. In the meantime, here’s Caitlin Murray on how today’s game may be settled:

The set piece battle

“We take set pieces very seriously,” Megan Rapinoe said in France before the USA’s first game of the tournament. “Those are moments you can practice, you can set things up, you can potentially catch the other team off guard, go quickly or if you’e got tricky plays. We have a lot of specialists in all the different areas of set plays.”

Although the Americans are traditionally been strong on set pieces, such scenarios haven’t been the deciding factor for the Americans yet. France, meanwhile, have scored five of their goals in this tournament from set plays.

Samantha Mewis, standing at almost 6ft tall, is the tallest outfield player the US have ever had. Wendie Renard, the French center back, has at least two inches on her and is the tallest player in this World Cup. If there’s a play the US will have to watch on corner kicks, it is surely Renard.

“She’s great in the air and a really well-rounded player,” Mewis said Wednesday. “We all have so much respect for her and I think our setup on set pieces will remain the same – we just have to make sure were doing our jobs and executing because she’s definitely dangerous.”

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