Japan defeated the USA in last night’s Women’s World Cup final to become women’s official AND unofficial champions. This means Japan now holds both the men and women’s Unofficial Football World Championships titles – and a host of other titles.The match, at the Commerzbank-Arena in Frankfurt, was a thriller. After a goalless first half, in which reigning women’s UFWC champions the USA were dominant, Alex Morgan eventually broke the deadlock in the 68th minute, only for Aya Miyama to equalise in the 80th minute. 1-1 after 90 minutes, the game went in to extra time.
Deep into the first extra half the USA again took the lead – star player Abby Wambach heading home Morgan’s cross. It was Wambach’s 13th World Cup goal. But again, Japan came back, this time through their own heroine – Homare Sawa. With just three minutes left to play, skipper Sawa got on the end of a corner to head an equaliser.
Japan survived the sending off of Asuza Iwashimizu and held out for the penalty shoot-out. Miyama, Mizuho Sakaguchi and Saki Kumagai all netted for Japan, but only Wambach converted her penalty for the USA. Japan won an epic match 3-1 on penalties.
As mentioned in the previous post, the victory means that Japan now holds SIX world football titles:
- Unofficial Football World Championships (UFWC)
- Women’s Unofficial Football World Championships (WUFWC)
- Official Women’s World Cup
- Unofficial Asian Continental Championships
- Unofficial Women’s Asian Continental Championships
- Official Asian Cup
You can continue to follow the Women’s UFWC, and other UFWC spin-offs, at the UFWC forum. Meanwhile, here on the main site we’ll continue to concentrate on the main UFWC competition. Next up in the (Men’s) Unofficial Football World Championships, Japan defend their title against South Korea on 10 August.
