U.S. Women Rout Argentina Again, 7-0
“Some days,” Mia Hamm was saying Sunday, “it’s based on who wants it more, not on who’s more talented or who’s fitter or who’s faster, but who wants it more.”
On Sunday afternoon, in front of an enthusiastic crowd of 14,608 at Spartan Stadium, it was clear who that someone was.
Hamm and the U.S. women’s national team ran Argentina ragged for 90 minutes en route to a 7-0 victory. Coupled with Friday night’s 8-1 win at Fullerton, the U.S. has left quite an impression on the South Americans.
Hamm, in particular, will haunt them for months.
After scoring two goals and assisting on four others Friday, she was held without a goal Sunday but created three and caused a fourth. One of them was to longtime friend and mentor Michelle Akers that made the score 3-0 just before the end of the first half.
“You put her in front of the goal with the ball at her foot, 99% of the time the ball’s going in the back of the net,” Hamm said of Akers.
The goal came off a corner kick, with Hamm floating the ball high into the goal area and Akers rising above the defense to power home a header. Hamm had no doubt that Akers would score.
“I was telling her at halftime, there was no question in my mind,” she said. “As soon as the ball left my foot and I looked up, that ball was going in the back of the net. She wanted it.”
The goal was the 96th of Akers’ 117-game international career. She and Hamm are closing in on an astounding 100 goals apiece for the U.S. team. Hamm, who has 87 goals in 145 games, says there is no race, however.
“All I care about is that we win,” she said. “If that means that Michelle is scoring all the goals or Tiffeny Milbrett or Julie Foudy, that’s fine.
“I think we’re working really well as a team right now. Milbrett and I have been talking a lot about getting that cohesiveness up front, working off each other. It’s working well now and I like it because she’s such a threat. I think she has the best technical speed in the world.”
Argentina found that out to its cost once again on Sunday. Milbrett, who scored a hat trick Friday, netted two more goals Sunday, both off passes from Hamm.
Also making it a long day for the South Americans’ defense were Kristine Lilly, who opened the scoring a mere 2:25 into the game; Brandi Chastain, who scored on a penalty kick after Hamm had been upended by Argentina’s Maria Villanueva after beating two other players and Foudy.
Capping a long day for Argentina, Andrea Arce deflected the ball into her own net off a Debbie Keller shot in the 76th minute to give the U.S. its seventh goal.
Long before that, U.S. Coach Tony DiCicco had virtually emptied his bench, bringing in, for the most part, younger and less experienced players, including Notre Dame’s Kate Sobrero, who made her national team debut.
Given the level of talent in the U.S., DiCicco easily could field two competitive teams in next summer’s FIFA Women’s World Championship.
“It’s very competitive in camp, and that’s the way it should be,” he said. “Everybody’s fighting for positions. I think it’s good that we have that type of depth because nobody can sit still and think that they can just have a position granted to them.”
