Well I would not say that Australia dominated at all but they won by two. If Japan's GK had just an average international level game the score would have been 0-0. As I said in an earlier post this means that if the US does not win their game by two or more Australia wins this pseudo-tournament.
I would of picked Alana Kennedy as mvp of the game even if she didn't score that goal. She's arguably the best CB in the world. lot of positives for the Matildas , definitely a new star is born in Carpenter(since Ford is still ailing). On the con side, they got to get more variety in their attack, than constantly going to Kerr
Carpenter has a chance to make the new All-Movement team. Gotta keep that tradition alive, since the All-Madden team is a thing of the past. The previous team (from early 2016):
OK, I'll start the argument: These CBs are all better than Kennedy: Wendie Renard, Steph Houghton, Beckie Sauerbrunn, Nilla Fischer, and right now Abby Erceg.
Agree to disagree on Kennedy. I'd say in the top 10, maybe. Carpenter is going to be the real deal; she's got a lot of upside.
final score US 4, Brazil 1, or was it 5-0? can't find an Brazilian that scored. Siberian Thunder@; now that Australia beat 2 higher FIFA ranked teams does this mean they get to move up??? and what about Japan; 3 straight losses, two of them against lower ranked opponents, will the sun set on them? Renard; probably more skillful than Kennedy, but at times, just not involved/or not as hard as a worker Houghton; she's a bit slow, I remember under the previous coach, Sampson, who played a very high line, When it got breached it was Bronze from RB trotting back way more swifter than Stephanie & saving Bardley's butt the Brunski; currently Ellis's #3 choice at CB Fischer; It's faded glory, I've been watching every Bundi game of the week for years which her WOB team played quite & yep, I've seen her get burned quite often in those times. Erceg, she did look good last Sunday, she too's a Bundi veteran, with a loosing club named Jena before she came to the states. with Kennedy you get an very agile player of which the coach showed so much confidence in her that he switched out early in the game the other CB for an more offensive minded one. and Alana is only 23!
I haven't run the calcs to see exactly, but yes Australia's two wins (and an officially-away draw) against closely-ranked opponents will earn them points, and considering the rankings are pretty tight in terms of ratings, I'd expect them to move up two or three spots. The fact that AUS were the lowest-ranked coming actually doesn't matter much because the ratings themselves were so close - the margins of victory are more important here. Likewise, Japan will lose points, but the only loss that will hurt them a lot will be the 0-2 to Australia (the loss to USA won't hurt too much because USA was very favored by rating, and the same for Brazil losing to the USA); that said, again it's pretty tight, so I'd expect Japan to drop two or three spots as well. I'd expect it to be a close call between Canada and Australia for the #5 rank, then Brazil and Netherlands as close for #7, with Japan down to #9 - but I'd have to actually do the calcs to be sure. Of course, we still have a few UEFA qualifiers to play before the next rankings come out, so Netherlands can still break out of the 7/8 band either way, and England need to not stumble.