2007 FIFA Women's World Cup

Teams

Main article: 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup qualification

The qualified teams, listed by region, with numbers in parentheses indicating final positions in the FIFA Women's World Ranking before the tournament were:

Venues

The venues selected to host the competition were:

Squads

Match officials

FIFA's Refereeing Department selected 14 referees and 22 assistant referees from around the world to officiate the 32 games that made up the final tournament. Candidate referees for the tournament were placed under scrutiny from 2005 onwards and attended a series of training camps. Candidates refereeing standards were regularly monitored at various tournaments around the globe before a final list was prepared. This was followed by a training camp in the Canary Islands in January 2007 and a final period of preparation and training at the home of FIFA in Zürich in May. No referees were chosen from the Oceania Football Confederation at the finals. The original selection group was made up of 42 entrants, 6 of which failed fitness tests resulting in the final group of 36 being confirmed for China. The United States was the only country represented by two referees.

Unlike the men's tournaments, the quartets of match officials do not necessarily come from the same country or confederation. This selection system was explained by Sonia Denoncourt, the head of women's refereeing at FIFA's Refereeing Department, "We don't have as many referees among the women and we certainly don't want to sacrifice quality. What we are looking for above all is compatibility on the field of play and the closest possible language links in the team selected for each game. The most important thing for us is that the referees have a good performance in the match." A fourth official was chosen from those referees not officiating a game at that time.

The referees stayed together throughout the competition at their hotel base in Shanghai. From there they travelled to the various venues for their designated games, before returning to base camp to continue with their specialised training programmes. As well as fitness training, they attended regular theory sessions and reviewed previous matches to try to identify possible errors and improve their performance levels. A psychologist was also assigned to the group to help with their mental preparations ahead of games.

Draw

The group draw took place on 22 April 2007 at the Guanggu Science and Technology Exhibition Centre in Wuhan after the completion of the qualifying rounds.

FIFA automatically seeded the host and defending champions, slotting China and Germany into Group D and Group A, respectively. The FIFA Women's World Ranking for March 2007 was used to determine the teams to occupy the other seeded positions, B1 and C1. United States were ranked first, Germany second and Norway third, so the United States and Norway were also seeded.

Also, no two teams from the same confederation could draw each other, except for those from UEFA, where a maximum of two teams from UEFA could be drawn into the same group. Group B quickly became dubbed the group of death since three of the top five teams in the world were drawn in this group – the USA (1st), Sweden (3rd) and North Korea (5th), according to the June 2007 FIFA Women's World Rankings, the last to be released before the tournament. The same four teams were drawn together in Group A in the 2003 FIFA Women's World Cup, on that occasion the US and Sweden progressed to the knockout stages.

Group stage

All times are local (UTC+8).

Group A

Main article: 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup Group A

Group B

Main article: 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup Group B

The four teams were also paired in the same group in 2003.

Group C

Main article: 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup Group C

Group D

Main article: 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup Group D

Knockout stage

Main article: 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup knockout stage

Bracket

Quarter-finals

Semi-finals

Third place play-off

Final

Main article: 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup final

Awards

The following awards were given at the conclusion of the tournament. FIFA.com shortlisted ten goals for users to vote on as the Goal of the Tournament. The Most Entertaining Team award was also decided by a poll on FIFA.com.

All-Star Team

Statistics

Goalscorers

• Marta

• Ragnhild Gulbrandsen

• Abby Wambach

• Cristiane

• Birgit Prinz

• Lisa De Vanna

• Kelly Smith

• Renate Lingor

• Christine Sinclair

• Sandra Smisek

• Li Jie

• Cathrine Paaske Sørensen

• Melanie Behringer

• Kerstin Garefrekes

• Aya Miyama

• Isabell Herlovsen

• Ane Stangeland Horpestad

• Lotta Schelin

• Lori Chalupny

• Heather O'Reilly

• Eva González

• Lauren Colthorpe

• Heather Garriock

• Collette McCallum

• Cheryl Salisbury

• Sarah Walsh

• Daniela

• Formiga

• Pretinha

• Renata Costa

• Candace Chapman

• Martina Franko

• Sophie Schmidt

• Melissa Tancredi

• Bi Yan

• Song Xiaoli

• Xie Caixia

• Anne Dot Eggers Nielsen

• Katrine Pedersen

• Vicky Exley

• Jill Scott

• Fara Williams

• Annike Krahn

• Simone Laudehr

• Martina Müller

• Kerstin Stegemann

• Anita Amankwa

• Adjoa Bayor

• Florence Okoe

• Yūki Nagasato

• Cynthia Uwak

• Kil Son-hui

• Kim Kyong-hwa

• Kim Yong-ae

• Ri Kum-suk

• Ri Un-suk

• Lise Klaveness

• Lene Storløkken

• Victoria Svensson

• Shannon Boxx

• Kristine Lilly

• Eva González (against England)

• Trine Rønning (against Germany)

• Leslie Osborne (against Brazil)

Assists

• Kara Lang

• Kerstin Garefrekes

• Renate Lingor

• Kristine Lilly

• Heather Garriock

• Cristiane

• Formiga

• Marta

• Melanie Behringer

• Sandra Smisek

• Camilla Huse

• Leni Larsen Kaurin

• Cat Whitehill

• Dianne Alagich

• Lisa De Vanna

• Caitlin Munoz

• Sarah Walsh

• Daniela

• Elaine

• Candace Chapman

• Kristina Kiss

• Christine Sinclair

• Ma Xiaoxu

• Zhou Gaoping

• Stine Dimun

• Katrine Pedersen

• Johanna Rasmussen

• Karen Carney

• Rachel Yankey

• Simone Laudehr

• Birgit Prinz

• Kerstin Stegemann

• Adjoa Bayor

• Gunhild Følstad

• Solveig Gulbrandsen

• Siri Nordby

• Ingvild Stensland

• Frida Östberg

• Therese Sjögran

• Victoria Svensson

• Lori Chalupny

• Abby Wambach

Tournament ranking

Per statistical convention in football, matches decided in extra time are counted as wins and losses, while matches decided by penalty shoot-outs are counted as draws.

quarter-finals group stage

Marketing

Sponsorships

Source:

Coverage

Numerous TV stations around the world provided coverage of the tournament. One notable example is the Chinese-language channel CCTV-5, which also broadcast over the internet via TVUnetworks.

Monetary rewards

For the first time in FIFA Women's World Cup history, all teams received monetary bonuses according to the round they reached (all in USD):

• Champions: $1,000,000
• Runners-up: $800,000
• Third place: $650,000
• Fourth place: $550,000
• Quarter-finalists: $300,000
• First round exit: $200,000

Other rewards

UEFA used the FIFA Women's World Cup as its qualifying tournament for the 2008 Olympic women's tournament. The best three performing UEFA teams would qualify for the Olympics. Originally it was thought that, should England make the top three European teams, they would compete under the United Kingdom banner. However, on 6 September 2007, FIFA issued a press release indicating that England were ineligible to participate in the 2008 Olympics as England does not have its own Olympic Committee. For the determination of the ranking only first through fourth place, quarterfinal elimination or group phase elimination counted. If there was a need to make a distinction between teams eliminated in the quarterfinal or between teams eliminated in the group phase these teams would meet in a play-off match. In no case would the points or goal difference count for teams eliminated before the semi-final.

Germany and Norway qualified for the Olympics at the World Cup, whereas Denmark and Sweden had to enter a play-off for the third Olympics spot. Sweden won both legs of the playoffs with a total of 7–3 on aggregate to qualify for the Olympics.

Controversies

Kenneth Heiner-Møller and Danish players accused the Chinese hosts of harassment and covert surveillance prior to China's first round match against Denmark. China's Swedish coach Marika Domanski-Lyfors and her assistant Pia Sundhage were unaware of the incidents and Heiner-Møller absolved them of any blame, although he refused to shake hands after the match.

Notes

References

References

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