I bet some Nigerians will say these are not women but men - the same way they make noise about our boys being over 17 and not under 17.

Thank God for Uwaka's goal the Falcons flew off with 1 point.

Is this the time we request for achatroom? I would love for moments like this to be taken to the chatroom, I am still over the moon for about Nigeria taking the under 17 World Cup.

those girls are old.

but am glad we got the goal
i dnt have much fate in the team

but i will be sure glad if they spring a surprise win on usa or korea.[i wish ]

abeg make una no start we age again, afterall dis aint age group competition, do u think if our girls are younger we would still win the tourney?

I am proud of the Falcons. They did a great job with SWEDEN. The Falcons being the underdog, we still come out with

1:1 draw. I hope they play better with the US and S. Korea.

yesterdAY'S PICS

KAI

THOSE GALS ALMOSTKILLED NE

I HEARD SWEDEN HAS NEVER WON AN OPENING GAME AT THE WOMEN' WC.

SINCERELY, I THINK NAIJA 'LL BEAT USA, IT AINT A DREAM

[size=18pt]NGA-SWE: Post-match quotes [/size]
Effiom Ntiero, Nigeria coach
This was a tough game. We knew the group was tough coming in. Today's was a balanced game. Sweden played well, but we stuck with them. They had a bigger reputation coming in to the game, but my girls played their hearts out today and never gave in. I could not be more proud. This is a great starting point, but now we want to improve with each match. You have to get better all the time to win a tournament like this and that is what we will try to do. I had to make some changes to my team for various reasons and all of the new players responded well to the challenge. We still have some big names to play in the USA and North Korea, so we have to be careful not to get ahead of ourselves.


Thomas Dennerby, Sweden coach
The result is not what we were hoping for. We had some very good chances in the first half and we hit the bar twice. We struggled late in the game and we were punished for not having taken our early chances. This is what happens when you switch off at crucial times in a game. Everyone in the group (B) has one point so anything can happen now. The USA and North Korea will be very tough games, but Swedish players always fight all the way to the end. We have a good chance to beat both of the teams we will meet next and that's exactly what we will focus on in the coming days.



Stella Mbachu, Nigeria midfielder
This was a wonderful result for us. The Swedes came out to beat us, but we never let them feel comfortable on the pitch. We played well and the result is a fair one. We showed our class on the field today and we hope to keep doing so.


Perpetua Nkwocha, Nigeria forward
This was always going to be a tough game for us. Very few people gave us a chance, but we never gave up and scored late to get level. This is the sign of a strong team with good psychology. We will hopefully keep up this form and get even better

Cynthia Uwak, Nigeria forward
I can't explain how good it felt to score that goal late and rescue a point for us. I play in Sweden so I know a lot of those Swedish girls. I will be able to walk tall when I go back there to play.

Victoria Svensson, Sweden striker
Of course it's disappointing to surrender a goal so late in the game. It's not the kind of thing any team should do. We were unlucky at times tonight, but now we have to get our heads right and come out better in our next two games.

Hanna Ljungberg, Sweden striker
We have to accept this result and move on, that is what we will do.

THE DAY REPLAYED -

In the provincial capital they call the 'City of Abundance', USA and Korea DPR staged a veritable feast of attacking football and gripping excitement, and by sharing four goals they underlined that the FIFA Women's World Cup will showcase the more even nature of the global game. Additional emphasis arrived later in the shape of two more drawn affairs, as England and Japan and then Nigeria and Sweden all put a point on the board.

If the Opening Match left the undeniable impression that Germany are once again the team to beat at China 2007, then day two suggested there will be a host of teams challenging for their crown. Prominent among them look sure to be Korea DPR, who gave USA a mighty scare in Chengdu.

From first to last the Koreans - fast, furious and relentlessly dogged - got in the face of their more illustrious rivals. If they had been slow to talk up their chances, reluctant to say too much about themselves, their first entrance on the China stage revealed them to be an outfit no one will dare take lightly.

They unleashed their first shot early, with just 12 seconds gone, and were still on the front foot in the dying seconds, calling Hope Solo into desperate but confident saves to safeguard a point for the two-time world champions.

If that was a meagre reward for a team who have become used to winning at the FIFA Women's World Cup - this was only the fifth time in 25 matches that victory had eluded them - then they were satisfied with it. The possession rating, 54 per cent to 46 per cent in Korea DPR's favour, showed the dominance of the Asian team, although the Americans had the most shots - 21 to 18.

One of those saw Abby Wambach maintain her astonishing record in the international arena with her 76th strike in less than 100 matches early in the second half. She was off the field receiving treatment for a head wound and heard the roars of the crowd as Korea DPR then forged ahead with two goals in four minutes.

The first owed something to the difficult conditions as the rain lashed down, Kil Son-Hui seeing her shot slip through the goalkeeper's grasp. Four minutes on and substitute Kim Yong-Ae slotted the ball home, but Wambach had rejoined the action in time to see Heather O'Reilly grab an equaliser. It was the first time Korea had registered a draw in their seventh game in the competition.

The afternoon fixture set a standard that the two later games would do well to match but again, there was so much to enjoy for the neutral supporters as the two games built to an exciting climax with late goalscoring drama.

In Shanghai, Japan were delighted by their opening goal, which came from Aya Miyama's hard-driven free-kick, but were then overtaken as Kelly Smith, making her FIFA Women's World Cup debut and tipped by the Chinese legend Sun Wen no less to emerge as the player of the tournament, really went to work inside the last ten minutes, scoring first with her left, then with her right.

However there was no denying the Japanese free-kick specialist and with the clock showing 94 minutes, she lashed the ball home from almost an identical position to her earlier goal.

Nigeria also struck late on to deny Sweden a first-ever win in an opening fixture. Mind you, the Scandinavians had only ever lost before so this counts as an improvement. Captain Victoria Svensson, her country's leading scorer in the 2003 tournament, finally broke the resistance of the African side's goalkeeper Precious Dede to put the Swedes in front and then, with eight minutes remaining, Cynthia Uwak, who like Dede plays her club football in Sweden, produced the leveller.

Well we played well but we need to up our game

Our defence.Hmm something needs to be done

Lets see how far we go

but here was an appreciable difference in the 2nd half sha

Yeah,there was a lil diffrence in d 2nd half nd dat led 2 d goal,bt as we al knw,d swedes always start the tournament on a slow note,moreso,they didnt play well 2day.our women need 2 walk on their fitness level,they were fallin too much.i like their courage thou,they re talking tough.

i still think we can qualify

china3-denmark2

Norway2 - 1 Canada

no matches 2 be played 2morrow

THE DAY REPLAYED - Goalkeepers at the FIFA Women's World Cup will take to their beds tonight fearing dreams (or rather nightmares) featuring opposing players unleashing power drives past them from long range. On Day Three at China 2007 there were some explosive examples of accurate shooting and it helped the host nation to launch their campaign with a spectacular 3-2 victory over Denmark in Wuhan.

Elsewhere Brazil employed similar speculation against New Zealand and received a handsome reward in the shape of five goals without reply, while a small slice of history was made as Australia won their first game in the competition at the tenth attempt. They defeated Ghana while former winners Norway edged out the 2003 semi-finalists Canada.

Take pity then on Jenny Bindon, who keeps goal for the Kiwis and who saw four piledrivers evade her desperate attempts to make a save. And also Heidi Johansen, who showed admirable resistance as China tried to meet the demands of a noisy and expectant 50,800 crowd. With two minutes remaining and Denmark having just equalised from 2-0 down, Johansen must have thought she would have only happy memories from this fixture.

Then, with two minutes remaining, Xiaoli Song struck a wonderful winner to add to the fierce strikes earlier dispatched by Jie Li and Yan Bi. It was a desperate blow for the Danes who thus extended their run of consecutive FIFA Women's World Cup defeats to seven, a competition record. Especially as their second goal, from Catherine Paaske Sorensen, had arrived only 60 seconds before.

Brazilian bombshell
After the fourth Brazilian bombshell flew past her, Bindon stayed down in her goalmouth for treatment. The towel was not thrown in but you could have sympathised had it appeared after Renata Costa had just left the New Zealand keeper picking her spectacular 25-yarder out of the net.

It was a contender for goal of the match but there were rivals for that accolade, including midfielder Daniela's rocket to open the scoring in the tenth minute. Cristiane joined in on the act with a goal from similar range to make it two and it was she who brought the much-vaunted Marta, FIFA Women's World Player of 2006, on to the honours board with the third. Marta later made in 5-0 as the Oceania representatives, who had given their all in attempting to stem the one-way traffic, visibly wilted.

[musty] wetin be this analysis all about.

how come Nigeria's no 10 resembles Mikel obi


England's team got a lot of gunners


and Ghana . .the male and female team wont kill persin o

Nigeria plays Korea today

and


USa plays Sweden before us


GO naija!

GO naija!

GO naija!

naija plays kora today

and


Sweden plays Usa b4 us

[b]
FIFA clears Falcons' Mbachu, Igbo of dope test[/b]From Gowon Akpodonor, China
FOOTBALL governing body, FIFA, has cleared two Super Falcons players, China-based Stella Mbachu and her Denmark-based counterpart, Chichi Igbo, of dope offences in the on-going fifth edition of the Women World Cup in China.

The duo were among the first set of players picked for dope test shortly after the commencement of the tourney. Mbachu was voted Woman of the Match in Nigeria's 1-1 tie against Sweden on Tuesday at the Chengdu Stadium. All unannounced tests conducted by FIFA's doping control doctors at the training camps ahead of the tourney proved negative.

So far, a total of 24 urine samples from the randomly selected teams of defending champions - Germany, New Zealand, Norway, Nigeria and Sweden - have been analysed at the WADA-certified laboratory in Beijing. This was announced at a joint FIFA/WADA media briefing with Prof. Jiri Dvorak, FIFA's chief medical officer, and WADA's Director General, David Howman, prior to the match between England and Japan, which ended 2-2 at the Shanghai Hongkou Stadium.


MORE. . .http://www.guardiannewsngr.com/sports/article03

I had previously thought that the Falcons are going to get whipped by the Swedes after checking the profiles of the players, but I think they can go far now if they put in more effort.

It all depends on if they can beat the Koreans today. The Swedes lost to USA 2-0.

Korea

these ladies can play

even if its Argentina we're playing against you'll make the same steatement, you always wish the worst for Nigeria

These Korean chics r really keeping the falcons on their toes, >>I just hop sumn ugly doesnt happen soon.!

Dinno wetin

I am saying what i have seen

the koreans na die

Yehh!!! e don happen!! !! !!

Na wah! O, see goal! Dem still de score goal from direct corner kick?