Japan stays aggressive with 3-1 victory over Norway; Spain pounces early in 5-1 rout of Switzerland
WELLINGTON, New Zealand — Japan scored its 14th goal of the Women’s World Cup and conceded its first Saturday, beating Norway 3-1 to reach the quarterfinals for the fourth time.
Guro Reiten headed a superb goal for Norway in the 21st minute to end Japan’s flawless defensive performance and leave the teams locked 1-1 a halftime. When the defense finally yielded, it was in unusual circumstances. In the 15th minute Miyazawa curled the ball in from depth on the left and Engen extended her leg to parry the ball. She managed only to deflect it wide of Aurora Mikalsen in goal for the eighth own goal of the tournament.
“There is still a long way to go but after we felt frustrated in 2019, I feel like we’ve overcome an obstacle,” Shimizu said. “We’ll head to the next one, but I feel we got a really great victory today. “‘I’ve seen them play in the group stage and they are a great team with a lot of good players and tactics,” Riise said. “The plan was for us to be strong in defense and not let them play too much into us.
Aitana Bonmati scored twice on Saturday as Spain routed Switzerland 5-1 in Auckland, New Zealand, and became the first team to advance to the quarterfinals. La Roja had never before won a game in the knockout stage in any major tournament, and finally advanced in its third World Cup appearance. Spain will play either 2019 runner-up Netherlands or South Africa in the quarterfinals in Wellington on Friday.
“We wanted to stay in the game for as long as we could and disrupt the energy,” Switzerland coach Inka Grings said. “But unfortunately we weren’t able to get in our game. Spain was able to take all their opportunities and use them.”
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