The FIFA 2023 Women World Cup is currently ongoing in Australia and New Zealand. It is the first-ever Women's World cup to feature 32 teams. The teams will be competing in eight groups, each consisting of four sub-teams.
This year's tournament has Australia and New Zealand as hosts, making it the first-ever co-hosted Women's World Cup. The tournament began on July 20, with the final taking place on August 20 in Sydney at the Accor Stadium.
The USA are the defending champions and are looking to become the first team in the competition's history to win the tournament three times in a row. This Women's World Cup is the first to feature 32 teams, after the previous edition in 2019 saw 24 countries compete.
All 32 teams in this year's tournament are from 6 confederations are: AFC (6), CAF (4), CONCACAF (4), CONMEBOL (3), OFC (1), and UEFA (11).
29 spots were originally competed for within the respective confederations. Haiti, Portugal, and Panama qualified for the final three places after winning their respective groups at the inter-confederation play-off tournament in February.
For this record setting competition format, there are nine host cities and ten stadiums, six in Australia and four in New Zealand. The six stadiums in Australia set to host the global female football stars are Accor Stadium and Allianz Stadium both in Sydney, Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, AAMI Park in Melbourne, HBF Park in Perth, and Hindmarsh Stadium in Adelaide.
In New Zealand, we have four stadiums hosting the competition: Eden Park – Auckland, Sky Stadium situated at Wellington, Forsyth Barr Stadium at Dunedin, and Waikato Stadium at Hamilton.
The group stages began on July 20, and it is to run over a two-week period finishing on August 3, and see group winners and runners-up progress to the round of 16, which takes place from August 5 to August 8.
The quarter-finals, which will be held in Wellington, Auckland, Brisbane and Sydney, are scheduled for August 11 and 12. The first semi-final will then be played on August 15 in Auckland, with the other semi-final taking place on August 16 at the Accor Stadium in Sydney, which will then host the final on August 20.
A third-place play-off will be played the day before the final on August 19 in Brisbane. The tournament promises to be a fun filled and competitive one, as the early signs we have already seen indicates. Nigeria's Super Falcons fought hard for a 0-0 against Canada in a fierce group B encounter at the AAMI Park in Melbourne.
The game saw the Super Falcon's goalkeeper Chiamaka Nnadozie make a stunning save to deny Christine Sinclair of Canada from the penalty spot to ensure the African giants picked up a point against the 7th ranked team in Women's football.
Tournament co-host New Zealand held on to secure the three points against Norway, thanks to a second half strike from Hannah Wilkinson.
Share This Post On
