AFP: No more weak teams at the 2023 Women's World Cup

After the first leg of the group stage of this year's World Cup - which featured 32 teams for the first time - fears that the tournament would see a series of tie-in matches largely did not materialize.

Morocco tasted a painful debut on Monday, as their first match at the World Cup ended in a crushing 0-6 defeat to Germany, one of the title contenders. Zambia also lost heavily 0-5 to the former champion Japan. But no match has witnessed destruction, like when the US beat Thailand 13-0 to open the way to winning the World Cup 2019.

In contrast, England, another championship contender, struggled to beat Haiti, who ranked 53rd in the world and entered the World Cup for the first time. The European champion even won only 1-0 thanks to a penalty from Georgia Stanway.

The US was expected to rain goals against the 32nd team in the world - Vietnam, but in reality only won 3-0, besides missing a penalty and creating a big difference in the number of shots 26. -0. Similarly, Spain beat Costa Rica 3-0. But they should have won easier than that when they launched 46 shots compared to one of the opponent. In Group A, after losing 0-2 to Switzerland in the opening match, the Philippines shocked when they beat host New Zealand 1-0. This is the historic victory of the Southeast Asian team in the first tournament.

US defender Naomi Girma commented: "Entering this World Cup, you can see how quickly women's football has developed and many teams have made great progress. So, I think it's time to see many countries. It's a good thing to start attending the Games. They appear and make an impression on the international arena."

FIFA has gradually expanded the number of teams participating in the World Cup, from 16 teams in 2011 to 24 teams in the last two times. This year, the congress has 32 teams for the first time.

Eight of them made their first appearance at the convention. Their debut in this arena promises to be a boost for them in the future, although some teams have to receive heavy defeats.

"It's part of the development process. They will improve from there," said the US star Megan Rapinoe, the positive impact of the 0-13 loss to Thailand at Reims in 2019. That's the difference. tournament record deviation. Before that, in 2015 in Canada, Germany crushed Ivory Coast 10-0 and Switzerland defeated Ecuador 10-1.

While Morocco, Zambia and Panama - which lost to Brazil 0-4 on Monday - tasted big setbacks, the other flagged teams produced encouraging performances in the opening match. Among these is Jamaica. They lost all three group stage matches in 2019, including a 0-4 loss to Italy. But on Sunday, Jamaica held the French heavyweight candidate 0-0.

"The gap between the teams is narrowing and that's what the sport needs to make big tournaments. Look at the England-Haiti game. The difference between them is almost non-existent," said Jamaican goalkeeper Rebecca Rebecca. Spencer said.

France coach Herve Renard commented: "France is used to overwhelming opponents in the opening match but that will change because women's football is growing stronger."

Women's football benefits from greater investment, both at the team and club levels. The total prize pool of this time is 152 million USD, three times more than four years ago. The large number of spectators who came to the field to watch the best women's football matches in Australia and New Zealand this time also reflected the growing interest in this sport.

Ahead of the tournament, FIFA President Gianni Infantino said: "Many people still believe that women's football is not a good sport, does not have a high level of entertainment or is just an imitation of men's football. But when you watch it, the first matches, they will understand the attractiveness and fun of the sport."

Although the gap between the teams has narrowed, the North American and European teams are still on another level. At the very least, the World Cup increasing the number of participating teams will give teams in other regions a chance to test their capabilities against top opponents.

Argentina coach German Portanova said after the home team lost to Italy 0-1 on Monday: "This match gives encouragement, and hopefully that we can compete fairly with European teams."