The USWNT is heading back home from January camp, and it will have some comfort on those long, long flights back across the international date line thanks to two wins against New Zealand.
Both wins against the Football Ferns (4-0 in the first in Wellington before Friday’s 5-0 win in Auckland) set new records for attendance for women’s soccer in New Zealand, with 12,721 at Eden Park holding a mark that will surely be broken with the arrival of the World Cup in July.
The U.S. outshot the Ferns 37 to two over the course of those 180 minutes; 18 of those were on target for the U.S., only one was for the Ferns, which resulted in a save from Alyssa Naeher in the first match. That lack of attacking threat means we didn’t learn all too much about the American backline, but it was encouraging to see the continued work at rotation for the goalkeepers. There was very little to judge Casey Murphy on in her appearance on Friday at Eden Park — more telling was that Naeher got the start in Wellington, the site of the USWNT’s most important group stage match against the Netherlands.
There was more to consider when it came to the midfield options, as well as the depth of the forward pool for both head coach Vlatko Andonovski and the viewers at home. But the top priority for the USWNT…
