It’s her married name apparentlySuch a nice traditional Dutch name too
It’s her married name apparentlySuch a nice traditional Dutch name too
Yeah, I suspected as much. I think she used to use her maiden name as well.It’s her married name apparently
I thought she played well - surprised she went offWhat happened to Groenen?
Oi!Gregorious busy player but looks about as much use as Dirk Kuyt
I think the women's game would benefit from a slightly smaller pitch.
Indeed.Smaller goals, definitely.
Woman’s football always impresses me with the quality on display, right up until they take a crack at goal and the keeper starts flailing helplessly at fairly central shots.
Which is different to, say, hockey where the women’s keepers look absolutely quality. Guarding a much smaller goal.
What was the best game of the tournament so far? It's just my superficial first opinion, but it seems the overall quality this time hasn't hit past levels yet. The games I've seen have been a bit awkward to watch as almost all goals kind of came out of nowhere and mostly the teams didn't actually look threatening in possession.
New Zealand so unlucky to come away from that empty handed, that’s football for you.
Yeah it seems unfair they play on regulation pitches, but then when you watch the US team or any other quality side, they seem to be fine. Maybe it’s just the fitness levels.Indeed.
Regarding the smaller pitch there was actually a New Zealand attack right now where their attacker had to cover quite some distance to the goal, but was so knackered when she got there, should could barely get a shot off. That's why the pitch should be smaller.
Smaller goals, definitely.
Woman’s football always impresses me with the quality on display, right up until they take a crack at goal and the keeper starts flailing helplessly at fairly central shots.
Which is different to, say, hockey where the women’s keepers look absolutely quality. Guarding a much smaller goal.
I’d be more inclined to agree with you if there was a problem of to much/easy goals. After watching Netherlands beat New Zealand 1-0 (barely), Cameroun concede one against Canada yesterday and Japan draw goallessly with Argentine, it’s more like even big favorites are hard pressed to find goals against the smaller teams.
Yeah. That does undermine my theory. Would be curious to know how the save % of female keepers compares with men. The gulf between them does seem a lot bigger than it is between outfield players.
I think that's mostly a training/technical thing though rather than reach. I don't think anyone's bothered by the very occasional shot that goes high in the top corner, the striker deserves that. It tends to be the handling/judgment errors that lets them down. I put that down to the fact that until recently most of them were amateurs, and most of the coaching was done by non-specialist amateurs. It's changing though as more teams go pro/semipro, there haven't been many goals scored on keeper errors this World Cup.
The downside to changing goal sizes would be that the women's game in most of the world and most teams even in England etc already struggles to get pitches/stadia. Making it different to the men's game could easily make a difficult situation with access worse.
In any case, it takes football back to its roots - those goal sizes were defined when the average man was roughly the same height as the average woman is today.