80' 2-0 Nigeria subs in (2 of 3) #7 Anam Imo (18 yrs!) for #17 Francisca Ordega -- who departs through the endline? (that's now the law) 83' 2-0 Nigeria subs in (3 of 3) for #12 Uchenna Kanu for #8 Asisat Oshoala.
That was a great finish by Oshoala. She was almost level with the goal when she struck that ball--had to be perfect to sneak in at such a tight angle. Well done.
84' 2-0 Kim Hyeri cross from 24m box right to 1m 3-left, Moon Mira header to left post, Nnadozie blocks it away, over endline left. 85' 2-0 Korea left ck, backpass, cross to 6-top right post, Nnadozie comes out and catches between players. She's been very effective all game. 86' 2-0 Ohale duels Lee Geummin at endline wide right, clears ball upfield -- and sits backward onto endline, stays down. Cramping? 87' 2-0 Korea cross to Yeo Minji facing away at 10m 1/4 left. Yeo darts back to 12m center, collects and turns ccw, shoots left foot pull across mouth to 1m center, Nnadozie dives and catches.
90' 2-0 Yeo Minji dribbles unmarked to 22m left post, shoots to 1/3 right, Nnadozie catches face-high. +4'. 90+3' (of +4') 2-0 Korea fk at 35m mid-right, Hwang sails it to 8m right post. Lee Geummin back-header drops to 6-top, Nigeria clear into near touch. 90+4' (of +4') 2-0 Ji Soyun cross to Cho Sohyun at 10m mid-left, she tries a header but shanks it high wide left. FT 2-0. Nigeria conjured up one perfect play, South Korea never found theirs.
So out of six games for the Asian qualified teams so far it’s been 0 wins, 5 losses and 1 draw. 22 goals conceded and only 1 goal scored. You could even argue that the sole goal was a harsh penalty to have even been awarded.
The bold is slightly misleading as 60% came from one match. The bigger surprise is that only 1 goal has been scored so far.
Last tournament, 3pts could get you through but you needed a nonnegative GD to do so. And considering the number of teams I'm expecting to get at least 3pts, I wouldn't be surprised if that held true this year as well, so Nigeria would need at least a draw against France....
In fact I seem to remember a player putting it wide by a large margin in a similar situation in a recent WWC match: maybe it was even Oshoala herself vs Norway? Not sure, can anyone remember the action I am talking about?
I pondered for long what that PK could have been, then I realized if was Kerr's one in Australia-Italy. I always have a hard time remembering that Australia is "Asian".
Define recent. I remember a goal you are describing from a match Germany lost in the quarterfinals(?). But that was a while ago....
FIFA official highlights of the match: How sad that the Korean player scoring in 2nd half was off-side for her arm only: basically, hadn't she raised her arm to call for the ball, maybe her goal could have stayed!!!
I did remember well: Oshoala basically had the exact same action in the game vs Norway: long drive from a team-mate from Nigeria's half of the pitch, Oshoala outruns the DF and dribbles the GK in the box. Only difference between the two actions: vs Norway, Oshoala put the ball so wide it was almost comical, vs Korea, her accuracy was sublime. You could even claim that the perfection of this goal came from the lesson of the mistake in the previous one! For the action I am talking about, see these video highlights (the action starts at about 1':25")