U.S. Women Draw World Cup’s Group Of Death

It’s might be debatable whether or not the U.S. Women’s National Soccer Team drew the “group of death”, but their group doesn’t exactly look like a cakewalk either.

The average FIFA ranking of Group C is 10.75, the best average ranking of any group and has three of the world’s top six ranked teams.

The U.S. Women’s National Team will be the top seed in Group C of the 2011 Women’s World Cup. Monday, they’ll learn who else will be in that group.

The remaining 12 teams will be drawn into the various groups. No countries outside of Europe will be in the same group as another team from their confederation. Europe has five teams in the tournament, with two being placed in Group A.

The U.S. secured the berth by winning 1-0 on Saturday, getting a goal from Amy Rodriguez.

That goal, which came in stoppage time of the first half, effectively covered up what had been a less-than-stellar performance up to that point.

Amy Rodriguez has given the United States Women’s Soccer Team a 2-0 aggregate lead over Italy as their World Cup qualifier heads into the second half of the second leg.

The goal was set up by a shot from Megan Rapinoe. Rodriguez was able to collect the rebound and beat Italian goalkeeper Anna Maria Picarelli.

The United States Women’s Soccer Team headed into Saturday’s match with Italy leading the two-legged playoff 1-0.

About 35 minutes in, they are retaining that lead.

Fergie Time might have to be re-named Pia Time after the United States’ incredible stoppage time goal against Italy. Before stoppage time began, the fourth official showed two minutes of extra time. After three minutes, Italy made a substitution, theoretically requiring the official to add time to the clock, even though the match should have already been over. That extra time would prove costly for Italy as substitute Alex Morgan scored in the 94th minute and the fourth of six minutes of extra time.

Morgan came on in the 86th minute for Amy Rodriguez, who was poor throughout the match. In fact, it became extremely tedious to count her mistakes as the climbed into the double digits in the second half. Morgan made an immediate impact when she came onto the pitch and the goal was not her first positive touch.

Italy will be the happier of the two sides at halftime, with the two teams going into the locker room knotted up at 0-0. Italy have executed their gameplan to near perfection, defending in a conservative 4-5-1 setup and keeping the United States from creating a high volume of goal scoring opportunities.

The best opportunity of the half came around a half hour into the match when Amy Rodriguez put a shot from inside the six yard box right into the stomach of the Italian keeper. It was a clear chance and she really should have done quite a bit better. Rodriguez has been plagued by poor finishing throughout the fall for the national team after a fantastic campaign in WPS.

I’m not the coach, and Sundhage knows these players better than anybody. But I can see things aren’t working. I can see no changes are being made, and as the States play out the first 23 minutes in Italy scoreless, I can only hope the players being selected take it upon themselves to make something happen.

The United States has hit the beginning of the end of their journey to qualify for the 2011 Women’s World Cup, needing to defeat Italy in a home and away playoff to qualify. The first half of that tie is this morning at 10:30 am ET in Padova, Italy. The rosters are out and coach Pia Sundhage has gone with the exact lineup that Jenna Pel and I predicted yesterday in our conversation about the game.

United States lineup: Barnhart, Buehler, Rampone, Lepeilbet, Mitts, Rapinoe, Boxx, Lloyd, O’Reilly, Wambach, Rodriguez