US women's soccer coach concerned about Canada

SHANGHAI, China (AP) U.S. women's soccer coach Pia Sundhage has only one fear when her defending champion team meets neighbor Canada in the Olympic quarterfinal on Friday.

"The most difficult thing is to avoid a battle," Sundhage said on Thursday, hoping that her players won't get caught up in a physical skirmish with the underdog Canadians when they meet in Shanghai.

The Americans have an overwhelming head-to-head advantage over the Canadians, have beaten them three times this year and once on penalties and, in their history, twice whipped them 9-1.

But this matchup has so much hanging on it. The Canadians would love more than anything to end the Americans' reign as Olympic champion.

"We hope to play soccer and find a rhythm," said Sundhage, who wants her team to make sure they don't have to go into many bone-crunching tackles. "A battle will be some sort of 50-50 situations. We like to keep possession and find a rhythm and I think that will be our chance to win the game. The first 10 minutes will be tough and whoever dictates the tempo has the chance to win the game."

American defender Heather Mitts will be on the field to feel the strength of the Canadian challenge firsthand.

"Against Canada we always expect a very physical game and we need to play our game and not get caught up in what their tendencies are," she said. "We play Canada quite often (this is the fifth time this year) so you would think by now we know what to expect from them."

The Canadians have made it to the knockout round on their debut in Olympic soccer and don't want to stop there. Yet forward Melissa Tancredi, who plays in the U.S. for the Atlanta Silverbacks, says that's an amazing feat already.

"That's insane," she said. "For us to be in the Olympics for the first time and to be in the quarterfinals, three matches away from a medal, is a great feeling."

Striker Kara Lang, who scored in only her second game for Canada at age 15, said the team was catching up with the Americans in terms of standard.

"It's a great opportunity for us, not only to advance and achieve something for women's soccer in Canada, but to beat our greatest rivals for the first time in a very long time. It's been very close in the past few games."

The other matchups on Friday are Brazil-Norway in Tianjin, China-Japan in Qinhuangdao and world champion Germany against Sweden in Shenyang. While Brazil-Norway is too close to call, if the games go according to form then it should be Brazil-Germany in one semifinal and U.S.-China in the other. The final is Aug. 21 in Beijing's Workers' Stadium.

While the Americans are after their third Olympic title out of four, both Canada and Japan have shown there is a much stronger depth in the competition than before.

Although their 2-1 victory over Argentina was expected, the Canadians drew 1-1 with China and only lost 2-1 to the favored Swedes, collecting four points for one of the two best third-place finishes to guarantee a place in the last eight.

Japan appeared to have no chance of that when it went into its final group game against the Norwegians in Shanghai with only one point. But it came from a goal down to outplay the former Olympic gold medalist 5-1 with some top quality counterattacking play.

The Japanese also finished as one of the best third-place teams.

Norway coach Bjarne Berntsen, whose nation won the Olympic title at Sydney 2000, praised the Japanese for their amazing fightback. But he believes the overall strength of the women's game has improved over the past few years.

"I really think that three, four or five teams are still at the top at the moment and are the real contenders for the top titles. But now to be at the top, we teams have to work much better, harder than before," Berntsen said.

"I don't really see four or five teams any more, I see 10-12 teams who are among the best in the world."