London Olympics: U.S. women’s soccer defeats Colombia, 3-0

LONDON -- Even with a painful shiner, Abby Wambach was able to keep her eyes on the prize Saturday: another Olympic gold medal in women’s soccer.

After a sucker punch from Colombian forward Lady Andrade blackened her right eye late in the first half Saturday, Wambach delivered the punch that knocked the South Americans out in the second, scoring to break open a tight game and send the Americans on to next week’s quarterfinals with a 3-0 victory.

“They’re trying to get me to retaliate, and I’m proud of myself for not doing that,” Wambach said after the game in Glasgow, Scotland. “She was taunting me the whole second half and in fact tried to punch me again in the face. So it was a clear tactic from them to try and get me to do something in retaliation.”

At first Andrade denied that.

“Nothing happened,” she said.

Then, well, she admitted something happened.

“We were both running, she ran across me and we collided,” she added.

Finally, she said it wasn’t her fault: “I had my hands in the air. It was an accident.”

But whatever it was, if it was meant to intimidate the U.S., the strategy backfired.

Megan Rapinoe, who has played spectacularly in her first Olympics, started the scoring in the 33rd minute, taking a nice touch pass from Alex Morgan and blasting a shot between two defenders from 20 yards out.

Then, after the U.S. players spent the halftime break stewing over the punch to Wambach, they came out and scored twice within a three-minute span midway through the half.

“She got punched full on,” keeper Hope Solo said. “All of us at halftime were pretty upset about it.”

Fittingly, the first goal went to Wambach, who outran two defenders to get to a Tobin Heath pass, then slipped it past keeper Sandra Sepulveda. Carli Lloyd closed the scoring in the 77th minute, converting a feed from Rapinoe.

WithFrance’s5-0 victory over North Korea later Saturday, the U.S. (2-0) is guaranteed a berth in the quarterfinals no matter the result of Tuesday’s group-play finale against the North Koreans.

kevin.baxter@latimes.com