Game

After taking an early two goal lead with a header from a corner kick over the U.S. keeper, and a brilliant bending ball by Sun Wen, China retained possession for much of the game. Their technical skill and speed thwarted the attempts by the USA to regain control of the match.

Post game quotes

U.S.National Team Head Coach April Heinrichs

China looks very well prepared to have the World Cup come to their country. Sun Wen is playing as well as I've seen her play in four years. They have speed, quickness and athleticism to compliment their team skill, and unlike 1999, they will be supported massively by their home crowd. In fairness, we lost on two world class goals.

These are some of the most difficult conditions that I've seen our women's national team face. As many as 10 players got sick, we are playing China in China, in front of 40,000 screaming fans, the temperatures were cold, but worsened by the rain and wind. Giving up two goals is hard to overcome, but our effort in the second half was phenomenal. We did everything we could in that second half to get a goal and a make it difficult for China. Several of our players had gutsy performances, they came to play. They rose to the occasion and led our team for the majority of the game. Each played with a big heart and each demonstrated why they are consistently chosen as starters for our team.

On the whole, I am still very pleased about this tournament and we are in a position to win it in our last game. We have given a lot of players playing time and we have been able to evaluate almost every player on this roster in a World Cup-like environment. The challenge for us is to bounce back from the disappointment of losing."

Lorrie Fair

China's speed of play was so quick. It was really hard to win the ball back from them when we lost it. We picked it up in the second half and got a big boost from the players who came into the game. Hopefully, we can carry that momentum to the Germany game.

Brandi Chastain

The crowd lived up to its reputation, it was a World Cup like environment. We were under a lot of pressure, but the positive was that we battled for 90 minutes and also put pressure on China. We had a fairly young lineup out there in the second half and they performed well.

U.S. Assistant coach Bill Palladino

Sun Wen is one of the most technically gifted players ever in the women's game. She plays with a tremendous amount of sophistication, athleticism and heart. The Chinese at this moment are playing as well as anyone in the world.

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