A WORLD OF WORRY FOR ENGLAND
The only talk of anything coming home had been from the stadium announcer at half-time, describing two spectators rolling to the finishing line in a giant plastic Jaffa orange.
It certainly feels like a long road ahead if england are to capture this World Cup on home soil. Some pips are probably going to squeak.
A second successive draw in a game they could and should have won leaves them likely to face a tricky play- off game against Italy, China or Korea, to reach the knockout stage.
The talk had been of england’s lamentably poor conversion rate from short corners, which present the sport’s prime goal- scoring opportunity, though it was the spurned chance of a field goal which would have haunted them last night. hannah Martin burgled America full back Ashley hoffman, advanced into the D and with the goal at her mercy, slashed her stick at fresh air. Rarely has the mantra about relaxing in front of goal applied more.
The same applied to england’s penalty corners. Laura Unsworth received most of them, firing a succession of strikes to the left side of the American goal, looking for her team-mates to navigate the ball in with deflections. That never happened. Susannah Townsend deflected one of Unsworth’s shots high against the bar but no one pounced on the rebound.
The goal which had sent england ahead was grace under pressure from Alex Danson. She calmly rose above the yolk of expectation before a 10,500 capacity crowd, easing her way across the edge of the Americans’ D, with little lifts over and under the ball, before shooting on the reverse off her back foot, low into the far right hand corner.
The goal on her 200th appearance, equalling Marjorie Pollard’s record of 115 for england, was like so many that have gone before from her.
But it was a measure of england’s missing intensity that they could hold the lead for only four minutes. The 18-yearold erin Matson was allowed to race down the American left and strike an equaliser, backhand on the run.
Maddie hinch, in the england goal, was visibly devastated to allow the ball in at her near post, though she had been left exposed. The backhand shot is notoriously difficult to read.
‘It’s the fine details on the last pass. We need to open up that passing lane,’ Danson reflected last night.
If her team are going to become the second to journey deep into a World Cup this summer they will do it from less promising beginnings than the footballers. Things will have to get better than this.