In what will remain a talking point, England needed a penalty to defeat Haiti 1-0 at the ongoing 2023 FIFA Women World Cup in Australia and New Zealand.
During the match played at Suncorp Stadium on Saturday, the Lioness of England who pundits said would whitewash the Women World Cup debutants failed to click as the relied on a retaking penalty kick by Georgia Stanway to beat Haiti 1-0.
Haitian Batcheba Loius had handled the ball in the box and a penalty shot taken by Georgia Stanway missed it but the VAR ruled that Goalkeeper Theus of Haiti offended the line rule which made the Ref to order a retake now scored in the 26th minute by Stanway of Bayern Munich.
The VAR had canceled a penalty awarded to England in the 17th minute. There has been a penalty in all the eight games so far at the 2023 FIFA women’s world cup that made reporters wonder whether matches must be won via penalty kicks.
By stats, Haiti did not perform well having 7 shots at goal with 2 on target against 21 shots at goal of England with 11 on target. England dominated ball possession 75-25 % and the stringed passes of 650 to England compared to223 of Haiti.
England committed 17 fouls to Haiti’s 5; had 2 yellow cards to Haiti’ one card and played 7 corner kicks to 3 meaning that England is not good at set pieces.
It will be recalled that Haiti defeated Senegal 4-0 and Chile 2-0 in the play off to make an appearance at the 2023 female world cup final.
England has never lost a group stage game against any CONCCAF team having won thrice and played a draw; missed Captain Leah Williamson and Beth Mead due to injury. The Lioness has never lost when scoring the first goal in a FIFA world cup having won 14 and drew 2 games and having won the last 10 games in the competition when scoring the opener.
The second round matches of this group will be played on Friday 28th July with England versus Denmark at 0930 hours and China versus Haiti at 12 noon. The last group matches will be played simultaneously on Tuesday 1st August as China takes on England and Haiti plays Denmark.
Denmark and China will take to the turf in a group D match at NIB Stadium, Perth Australia at 1330 hours of Saturday 22nd July.
On Sunday 23rd July, Sweden versus South Africa at 0600 hours; Netherlands versus Portugal at 0830 hours and France versus Jamaica at 1100 hours Nigerian time.
