Issue 2.1.1 "Kick Off!

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Friday, June 7, 2019

     HOST FRANCE OPENS WITH A BANG
Unofficially, 44 entries grace our 2nd HWCI Women's World Cup Pool

HOME, CA (smt) -- Host A1-France came out to play and any nerves were gone with an early goal and continued to dominate the first half and control the second half in a 4-0 rout of A2-Korea Republic.  A great sellout (45,261) atmosphere in Paris saw a flyover with blue, white, and red smoke and nice opening ceremony (thanks, Telemundo via NBC Sports App!) push the women's game to new heights.  Acontroversial VAR decision held FRA from dominating further as a beautiful goal in the 27' was taken away by a reversal and declaring offsides (by like a few inches, if we trust the screen cap).  Didn't take long for VAR, which debuted last year in the men's World Cup, to become the spotlight.

Unofficially, we set a Women's World Cup record with 44 entries (from a record 31 people), which is double the 22 we got in our inaugural pool.  It also surpassed the men's EURO pool in 2012 (39) and 2016 (27) and the first two men's World Cup pools (21 in '98, 23 in '02) and matched the men's World Cup pool in 2006.  Unscientifically, our pool shows the interest in women's soccer is 55.7% of the men's (79 entries last year) which is much better than the 38% equal pay disparity the women's lawsuit alleges. 

Great Support in France (6/7)

Here is the first of my "Dailies", game day updates of our 2nd HWCI Women's World Cup pool.  Here is where most information on the pool will happen.  Emails will be sent after every major phase (e.g., after Round of 16 matches) but daily updates will occur here and posted on Twitter using #hwciWC. 

It is so great to see the sellout and loud crowd in Paris.  Such great support for women's soccer and the A1-French team dominated so well, it made me forget about the female Zidane, Louisa Necib!  After nearly getting a Pando score (5-0), and would've been except for VAR (Video Assistant Referee), FRA shook off their jitters and completely routed A2-Korea Republic, 4-0, to open the Women's World Cup.  Speaking of VAR, no one seemed to know why the FRA goal in the 27' was being reviewed for so long.  Both the English (Fox) and Spanish (Telemundo) commentators saw either inconclusive or no offsides but after a couple minutes, the ref drew the imaginary box and disallowed the goal!  At least FIFA provided a screen cap of the offsides but only showed it for a few seconds.  VAR has to show this type of screen cap every time because it lessened the controversy, though really, draw some thicker lines for "gray areas" because a couple inches should be "close enough" and not have to stop the momentum of the game (really, it felt like FRA was going to win 10-0) and take away a beautiful goal.

Well, unofficially we have 44 entries and all 44 picked FRA so everyone is tied for 1st!  The 44 entries is double 2015's total and is more than the men's EURO pool (37) in 2016 and tied the men's EURO pool in 2012.  This is 56% of the men's total last year so unscientifically, we can say the interest in the Women's World Cup is 56% of the men's World Cup which is pretty good.

Admin Picks

Boy, the USA really does have a tough road.  To play not only the #4 team in the Quarters but the host nation as well, that'll be a challenge.  And if the make it past France, then they likely get #3 England.  Meanwhile in the lower bracket #2 Germany would face just the 2nd place team from either Group E or F in the Quarters and in the Semis, at best either #5 Canada, #6 Australia (who got whalloped by #8 Netherlands), or #7 Japan (too young).  But will the GER women's team choke like the men's team did last year and not even make it out of the group?  Will an African team (none ranked higher than #38) surprise this year?

Here are my two entries in the pool.  As this is our 10th soccer pool, my main entry is Futbol Fabone Dix (10).  And in support of rebuilding from the horrible fire at Notre Dame in April, let's please Restore the Spire.

Good luck to everyone!  We have 39 entries which is great with 12 hours to go!

Surprising Results

Less than five days away from kicking off the 2019 Women's World Cup and some friendlies have had some surprising results.  On Saturday, #3 and Group D top seed England lost to #19 New Zealand (Group E), 1-0, and #6 and Group C top seed Australia got hammered by #8 Netherlands (Group E), 3-0.  On Sunday, a couple of friendlies in France saw #7 Japan (Group D) rally to tie #13 Spain (Group B) while #12 Norway was the least surprising in thrashing #49 South Africa (Group B) 7-2.  New Zealand will be the last World Cup team to play a friendly, traveling to face Wales on Tuesday.

We have 16 entries thus far, certain to surpass 2015's total of 22 and likely pass the 27 we got for Euro 2016.  We are a long ways off in catching the men's World Cup total of 79 entries last year but we shall see.  Because the World Cup 2018 pool started just five days before, technically we have more entries for the Women with five days to go (16 to zero) ;-)

Remember, you have until noon PDT on Friday to enter the pool.  Enter online now!