Giulia Galli gets her round of applause at 87'; Roma's team-mate Caterina Iannaccone takes her place.
Italy 3-0 Costa Rica, FT. Italy join Brazil at the top of the group with an identical goal difference. Next up are the host of Morocco, who shouldn't be irresistible despite the home advantage. Good start of the tournament.
While Italy's U-17 WWC was starting, the third match-day of Serie A Femminile was beginning to be played. In the first match of the day, Sassuolo made up for last week's last minute's loss in the Emilian derby vs Parma by beating Como through an early goal by powerful Cameroonian FW Naomi Eto, who was dangerous all along the rest of the game. Como appealed for an hand-ball in the box in the last minutes of additional time, but it wasn't given even after the check, although the impression was that the touch was there and the arm wasn't very close to the body. Anyway, despite some sparse chance, Como didn't show enough to deserve the draw. The second match saw two newly-promoted teams clash against each other, Genoa and Ternana: the host team scored first, with Albanian MF Alma Hilaj, but young U-19 talent Giada Pellegrino Cimò, after having seen a first goal of her being disallowed for off-side, managed to equalize almost right away. In the end, though, in the 2nd Half, Ternana, despite having replaced their young GK from last week with more experienced Gloria Ciccioli, paid their absolute inability to defend Corner-Kicks, since Genoa scored twice from two similar actions, at first with Maltese Emma Lipman and then with Valeria Monterubbiano. It was the first win in Serie A Femminile for Genoa. Fiorentina, after a loss and a draw in the first two match-days, needed this win at home at all costs: they got it, but they did through some high-tension thrilling drama. When they scored a PK in the middle of the 1st Half with Emma Severini it looked like everything was smoothly going their way, but then Milan scored two back-to-back goals before HT with 20 yo Monica Renzotti and with Angelica Soffia (after an elegant dummy by Thea Kyvåg ). The hosts managed to equalize with Madelen Janogy at the beginning of the 2nd Half, but Milan went back ahead almost immediately with Monica Renzotti's personal brace and kept the advantage until the end of the regular time. Then, at 90'+2', Madelen Janogy wrapped up a brace of her own with another header. At that point it definitely looked like the game was going to end in a draw, but let's not show @Lohmann what happened to Laura Giuliani at 90'+7' , allowing young Icelandic Katla Tryggvadóttir to become the hero of the day! Despite this final score and this goal-festival, Fiorentina's performance keep looking suspect. Results of today: Sassuolo 1-0 Como Genoa 3-1 Ternana Fiorentina 4-3 Milan Highlights:
Thank you that you warned me Spoiler (Move your mouse to the spoiler area to reveal the content) Show Spoiler Hide Spoiler but of course I was so dumb to watch itCoincidentally my favourite team (Arminia Bielefeld) also lost 3:4 (in a derby) so that's a bad day. I hope Soncin hasn't watched the Milan match. More respect to your future sports minister!
Meanwhile, highlights of today's U-17 WWC game, with the brace by Giulia Galli and the single goal by Anna Copelli (I am not sure if Italian TV will be allowed to upload their highlights, so, at least for the moment, I post FIFA's official ones ):
Meanwhile in the USA... Washington Spirit lost by 2-3 at home to Orlando Pride, but they had finished the 1st Half being ahead, through... another back-heel goal by Sofia Cantore! Maybe she discovered that in NWSL they don't know about this kind of shot and she's taking advantage of it. Surely, from now on, opponent players will take attention to defend the back-heel option (and will leave her open for the direct shot ).
Unexpectedly, today's Napoli-Roma was a top-of-the-rankings clash. Roma anyway made clear what's the difference between the two teams. The goals only came in the 2nd Half, but when it rains it pours and the visitors scored three with a combination of their top young Italian talents: Giulia Dragoni had one goal and one assist, while Alice Corelli, who was today wearing the captain's armband, scored a brace. The lonely goal at 90'+1' for Napoli by Belgian Davinia Vanmechelen didn't change much. Roma are now the only team with a perfect record. Lazio, who was part of the triplet at the top last week, lost indeed to Juventus at home. It was actually a quite balanced game and probably a 0-0 draw would have been fair. In the end, though, a quite random hand-ball by Eleonora Goldoni gave Juventus a PK, that was converted at 86', when it was too late for Lazio to come back. Impressingly, it wasn't just Cristiana Girelli's first goal in this league, but it was even the first goal scored by Juventus in this season! This win will sure help them coming out of the hole they had dug themselves in, but there is still quite some work to do. Finally, the evening match between Inter and Parma ended in a 0-0 draw and you can tell by the highlights that whoever edited that video was scraping the bottom of the barrell to find any kind of meaningful action. Inter could have reached the 2nd place with a win, but they can't seem to convert their few and sparse chances, so they are stuck at 4th place. Is it possible that the European competitions are taking their toll on the Italian clubs who are engaged in them? Recap from today: Napoli 1-3 Roma Lazio 0-1 Juventus Inter 0-0 Parma Highlights from today (not sure why the quality of some of the cameras in Lazio-Juventus was so bad ): Serie A Femminile's new rankings: 1.Roma 9 9-2 2.Lazio 6 4-3 3.Napoli 6 6-6 4.Inter 5 7-2 5.Fiorentina 4 6-6 6.Sassuolo 4 2-2 7.Juventus 4 1-1 8.Parma 4 2-5 9.Genoa 3 5-5 10.Milan 3 6-7 11.Como 3 2-3 12.Ternana 0 4-12
Morocco-Italy just started as an evening match. These are Italy's starters (just one change compared to the match vs Costa Rica: Giulia Robino instead of Benedetta Bedini) vs the host of the tournament: Robbioni; Venturelli (c), Verrini, Randazzo, Bressan; Robino, Giudici, Copelli; G. Galli, Volpini, Guerzoni.
Giulia Galli is really impressive! She scores at 5' already, from an assist by Viola Volpini: Morocco 0-1 Italy!
0-2 Italy at 14', once again Giulia Galli froma Corner-Kick action. It's not going to end well for Morocco. Since Costa Rica-Brazil ended up in a 1-1 draw in the afternoon, Italy could take the top of the group with a win here, waiting for the clash vs Brazil in the third match.
Marocco are quite unable to defend set pieces: on a FK from the Left-Side, their GK makes a serious blunder by spilling the ball and Rachele Giudici slams it in! 0-3 Italy at 24'!
Wow, at 45'+2' a VAR-review saves Italy from a Red Card to GK Matilde Robbioni, who, after passing the ball to an opponent, came out of her box to save a shot, but in the end it was decided that the ball had only hit her chest and not her arm! This could have change the course of this game and of the whole tournament for Italy; instead the 1st Half ends on a reassuring 3-0 advantage for Italy, with all of the players on the pitch. Phew.
Italy has played very softly in this 2nd Half and now, at 81', Morocco scores. First goal against Italy in this tournament.
at 90'+1' Marzia Piermarini replaces Rachele Giudici. 5 minutes of additional time to play and Marocco are pushing, after their goal.
Morocco 1-3 Italy, FT. Italy advance to the Round of 16 and a draw vs Brazil on Friday will be enough to top the group (and to subsequently get a better pairing, since the winner of the Group A will get a third-placed team from groups C, D or E).
apart from posting the usual FIFA highlights (it looks like there can't be FIGC ones, I suppose for copyright reasons ), I want to underline that Giulia Galli is currently the top scorer of the whole tournament with 4 goals, level with Spanish striker Carlota Chacón.
While the U-17 WWC is underway with so brilliant results for Italy so far, the Senior Team is going to play two friendlies vs top-teams: Japan in Como tomorrow (18:15) and Brazil in Parma on Tuesday the 28th (again at 18:15). This is the list of the players who were called for these two matches: Goalkeepers: Rachele Baldi (Roma), Francesca Durante (Lazio), Astrid Gilardi (Como), Laura Giuliani (Milan); Defenders: Caterina Ambrosi (Parma), Valentina Bergamaschi (Roma), Lisa Boattin (Huston Dash), Federica D’Auria (Lazio), Martina Lenzini (Juventus), Elena Linari (London City Lionesses), Beatrice Merlo (Inter), Elisabetta Oliviero (Lazio), Cecilia Salvai (Juventus), Angelica Soffia (Milan); Midfielders: Giulia Dragoni (Roma), Giada Greggi (Roma), Nadine Nischler (Como), Marta Teresa Pandini (Roma), Eva Schatzer (Juventus), Emma Severini (Fiorentina), Martina Tomaselli (Inter); Fowards: Chiara Beccari (Juventus), Barbara Bonansea (Juventus), Michela Cambiaghi (Juventus), Sofia Cantore (Washington Spirit), Alice Corelli (Roma), Cristiana Girelli (Juventus), Margherita Monnecchi (Lazio), Martina Piemonte (Lazio), Elisa Polli (Inter). As usual, Andrea Soncin called a lot of players (30): probably he wants to start tinkering with the next World Cup in mind. We miss some key players who are out injured: Manuela Giugliano, Lucia Di Guglielmo and Arianna Caruso, who just recently had to give up to the shoulder-injury she suffered in the last match with Bayern. Someone else is back (Giulia Dragoni, who completely recovered from her injury, as seen in the recent Roma's match where she played and assisted like a champ) and there are also players at their first call: Parma's DF Caterina Ambrosi, a veritable surprise-call , and Alice Corelli, who's actually not a surprise at all; on the contrary, it's actually surprising that she hadn't been called yet! @dravde will be happy for that. Federica D'Auria and Nadine Nischler are back, after not making the roster for the Euro. Valentina Giacinti hasn't been called, instead, and she publicly expressed her disappointment. News for @Lohmann : Looks like Laura Giuliani will be officially celebrated for her 100th cap, since it had been more or less overlooked during the Euro, when it had actually happened. The first game, tomorrow vs Japan, will take place just before the U-17 match (it will be a non-stop evening of watching Italian and Japanese women's football for me ). I could be biased, but I don't expect Italy to manage to beat Japan, despite playing home: Nadeshiko Japan have too many internationals looking in full form, while Italian players, despite the season having started early with the Women's Cup, look like they are still going through the motion and were sometimes disappointing in the Champions' League. Maybe Brazil, despite being one position ahead of Japan in FIFA women's ranking (#7 instead of #8) could be more beatable for Italy, but let's not forget that Italy basically overachieved at the Euro and I don't think they're at top-10 level yet. It will be an interesting test nonetheless.
I am going to watch the game on TV while having dinner, so I'll mostly won't interact here. I'll just post Italy Senior NT's line-up for the upcoming friendly match vs Japan: Italy: Giuliani; D’Auria, Lenzini, Linari (C), Oliviero; Severini, Schatzer, Greggi; Bonansea, Corelli, Girelli. Interesting starts for Federica D'Auria, Eva Schatzer and Alice Corelli; they're balanced by the experience of veterans Barbara Bonansea and Cristiana Girelli. (yes, yes, and of Laura Giuliani ).
0-0 HT. Italy arguably had two of the three more dangerous chances in this half, with Alice Corelli and Cristiana Girelli, but they came from mistakes of the opponent defense: for the rest Japan basically dominated possession and camped in Italy's half and could (should?) have scored at 45'+2' with a golden chance that Kiko Seike wasted by sending her lob slightly high over the crossbar. Without Arianna Caruso and Manuela Giugliano, Italy's Midfield is too light and unexperienced and the likes of Yui Hasegawa maraud it at their will. If things are the same in the 2nd Half, I expect Japan to score, eventually.
Unexpectedly (at least to me) it was Italy scoring at the beginning of the 2nd Half, and with a brillant action, including a double back-heel pass in the box (first by Emma Severini, than by Cristiana Girelli) that freed Giada Greggi for a nice curved shot that found the far upper angle of the goal (2nd goal ever for her in NT: she was quite emotional about it). For about 10 minutes Italy were galvanized by the goal and put Japan under some pressure; later on, though, they started losing ground, until, fatally, Japan's goal came, with a brilliant Yui Hasegawa's volley-lob that caught Laura Giuliani in no-man's land. Japan subsequently kept most of the possession and was again mildly dangerous, but I guess the final 1-1 draw was a fair result for what had been seen on the pitch. Also consider that Andrea Soncin's line-up was highly experimental and that today a whopping 4 players debuted for Italy's Senior NT: Alice Corelli as a starter and Margherita Monnecchi, Martina Tomaselli and Nadine Nischler along the 2nd Half. Also, there were starters (Federica D'Auria, Eva Schatzer) and subs (Giulia Dragoni, Elisa Polli) who had a quite limited number of caps for the Senior Team. So, I guess a draw vs a top-10 team could be seen in the end as a good result, although at home.