US Women Destroy Russia 7-0
The US Women’s National Soccer Team returned to Florida today and extended its unbeaten home streak to 79 games as they hammered Russia 7-0. Midfielder Carli Lloyd and forward Christen Press both scored twice and Heather O’Reilly, Sydney Leroux and world goal scoring record holder Abby Wambach also found the score sheet.
In a convincing win the U.S. WNT also extended its unbeaten streak overall to 41 games (35-0-6), dating back to March of 2012. The seven-goal victory was the USA’s most lopsided win since a 7-0 rout of Mexico on Sept. 3, 2013, at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C.
The U.S. thoroughly controlled the run of play against Russia as they dominated possession from the start. After creating several good opportunities largely through some great work by Heather O’Reilly the scoring deluge began in the 29th minute as Carli Lloyd (pictured above) worked an opening before blasting her shot past Russia goalkeeper Elvira Todua and into the upper right corner for a 1-0 lead.
Four minutes later, O’Reilly ( Pictured above) found some fortune as a cross from the left deflected off Russia left back Marina Pushkareva and ricocheted to the U.S. midfielder who calmly placed her shot into the upper right corner for a 2-0 advantage and her 38th-career goal.
O’Reilly was dominating things so much that Russian head coach Sergey Lavrentyev found himself forced to replace left back Marina Pushkareva with Elena Medved but the change did nothing to slow the U.S. attack as Lloyd scored again in the 37th minute. After bringing down a Stephanie Cox pass from the left side with her chest, Lloyd found herself unchallenged and blasted her shot onto the roof of the net to make it 3-0.
In the second half, the USA showed they weren’t going to go easy on their opponents as they picked up right where they left off with Lloyd crossing to find Christen Press (pictured above), who placed a firm header past Todua in the 51st minute.4-0.
Three minutes later things got even worse for Russia as Sydney Leroux (pictured above) made it 5-0. A pass from Lauren Holiday seemed to be heading towards the corner flag but Leroux brilliantly manged to fight off her marker and touch the ball past Todua as she fell to the ground.
Press then grabbed her second goal of the match and the 10th of her young international career in the 58th minute after a corner bounced out to Ali Krieger at the edge of the box. The right back’s shot smacked off the chest of the Russia goalkeeper and Press eagerly tapped the rebound home to make it 6-0.
This was the sign for U.S. WNT head coach Tom Sermanni to replace Leroux and Press with Amy Rodriguez and Abby Wambach in the 60th minute. This was the last thing Russia wanted at this stage of the game and just minutes later Wambach tallied the 164th goal of her career as she made the score 7-0. The move was simplicity itself as Amy Rodriguez supplied a nifty back heeled pass to Wambach, who was mysteriously left unmarked, and she made no mistake.
Russia were then forced to play the last 20 minutes of the game with 10 players as defender Valentina Orlova took down Rodriguez who was clean through on goal and was correctly shown a straight red card for being the last defender.
The game was the first of a two game series as the sides square off again on Wednesday 12th February at the Georgia Dome in Atlanta. The game kicks off at 7:30 p.m. ET and will be live on ussoccer.com. Fans can also follow the U.S. WNT on Twitter @ussoccer_wnt. Hopefully the cooler weather will help the Russian team put up more of a fight!
More photos at www. FloridaLeisurePhotography.com
