The United States women’s national team under new broom Emma Hayes are two wins from a record-extending fifth Olympic gold medal, after a Trinity Rodman wonder strike in extra time broke open a tightly contested quarter-final with Japan that failed to catch fire until the final reel.
The women’s football tournament at these Paris Games should at least begin to determine whether the Americans’ torpid 46-month run under the departed Vlatko Andonovski will be remembered merely as a flop period or, as a practically salivating global football establishment have openly manifested, a permanent regression from the class of perennial favorite.
