The Daily Observer London Desk: Reporter- Judith Benjamin
The last time he coached a team at a World Cup, just eight months ago at the men’s tournament in Qatar, Hervé Renard masterminded arguably the biggest surprise in that competition’s history, when his Saudi Arabia team stunned the eventual winner, Argentina, in their opening game.
Here in rain-soaked Sydney, Renard, coaching a women’s team for the first time in a coaching career stretching more than two decades and across three continents, just about avoided the opposite fate on Sunday. His France team, which arrived in Australia with the stated aim of reaching at least the semifinals of the Women’s World Cup, finished its tournament opener with a scoreless draw against Jamaica, a team making only its second tournament appearance after losing all three of its games four years ago.
In a poor game, France had a flurry of chances late to make up for its disjointed play. But Jamaica largely held its own, even though it was ranked almost 40 places lower than France in the pretournament standings (oddsmakers similarly considered Jamaica a 40-to-1 underdog to win).
Instead, it was Jamaica’s star striker Khadija Shaw who threatened to author one of the biggest upsets in recent tournament history, until she was given a red card in the waning minutes of the match.
With her bustling runs, Shaw, a player on big spending English team Manchester City, was difficult to counter — a wrecking ball on both sides of the field who tore into the French defense with slashing runs and who charged at her opponents repeatedly to take back the ball. It was that eagerness that led to her dismissal late as the game hurtled toward a frantic finish, with Jamaica hoping to hold on and France desperately trying to score.
France, a team stitched together by Renard after almost falling apart with infighting and mutiny just months ago, looked far less than the sum of its parts and well short of the play needed for its stated goal of reaching a semifinal.
Jamaica, which rightfully celebrated its first World Cup as if it had won, provided yet more evidence that the gap between women’s soccer’s elite teams and the rest might be narrowing.
Jamaica had for nearly the entirety of the game kept France from creating the type of chances expected of its highly rated attack. But just before the game entered stoppage time, Kadidiatou Diani, a striker on Paris Saint-Germain, leaped into the air and connected with a header that cannoned back into play after striking the goal post, with the Jamaican goalkeeper Rebecca Spencer only able to watch.
That chance was the cue for chaos that included Shaw’s red card and a late charge from France that yielded little beyond half chances and snatched shots.
Shaw’s red card, the result of two yellow cards, means she will miss Jamaica’s next game against Panama on Saturday. “To lose a player of that stature is a big loss,” said Lorne Donaldson, Jamaica’s coach. He added that Shaw’s teammates will have to step up in her absence so that Jamaica still has something to play for when it meets Brazil in its final group game.
France gets Brazil next.
“We just only started the competition today and there’s still a long way to go,” said Renard, adding that he hoped Jamaica repeated its efforts against Panama and Brazil, the other two teams in Group F.
