USA sealed their fifth successive trip to a FIFA U-20 Women’s World Cup by winning the CONCACAF qualifying competition in Guatemala at the weekend. The two-time world champions will be joined in Germany this July and August by runners-up Mexico and hard-charging debutantes Costa Rica, who edged last year’s regional champions Canada to the last spot.
The Americans, coached by up-and-coming UCLA coach Jill Ellis and led on the pitch by the clinical Sydney Leroux, made relatively easy work of picking up their second U-20 women’s title in North, Central America and the Caribbean. The defending world champions breezed through their group with consecutive wins over Mexico, Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica in which they scored 12 goals and conceded just one.
In only their first game, Leroux made her mark, scoring a brace in the 6-0 defeat of Jamaica. Two more goals for the Southern California-based ace followed in the 4-0 victory over T&T, and then she got the winner in the final section contest, a 2-1 reverse of arch-rivals Mexico.
Although she failed to score in the semi-final win over Costa Rica, Leroux was back on target in the final, her solitary, 86th-minute effort earning USA victory in a gritty rematch with Mexico. “I was in absolute shock. I was so excited I put my hands in the air and screamed,” said the University of California at Los Angeles star.
“The whole team came over. I guess they didn’t know in the bench and in the stands that it had gone in because it looked like it hit the top of the net, so they didn’t know until I ran around. It was so exciting. I feel the same way I felt at the World Cup when I scored in the final. It’s the same type of excitement.”
source:http://www.fifa.com/u20womensworldcup
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