Women's Football VS Denmark Preview: The first game is a life-and-death battle, the main lineup may save a change
At 20:00 on July 22, Beijing time, the 2023 Women's World Cup Group D will compete for a focus match. The Chinese women's football team will usher in its first opponent, the Danish team. The first game is against the biggest competitor who qualified in the group stage. For the women's football girls, it is undoubtedly a life-and-death battle. The Chinese team must strive for the best result. If they cannot win or even lose in the end, it will be very difficult to qualify for the group stage.
In order to prepare for this Women's World Cup, the Chinese Women's Football team organized a training camp as early as mid-May. The team first conducted a 25-day training session in Shanghai, and then moved to Qingdao for the next stage of preparation. The team finally announced the list of 23 players for the World Cup on July 5, and set off for Australia on July 7 to officially start the World Cup tour.
The Chinese team's opponent in the first game, Denmark, can be said to be the biggest opponent of the women's football girls. The rankings of the two teams are close. Denmark is currently ranked 13th in the world, while the Chinese team is ranked 14th. Although the rankings are close, the overall strength of Denmark is still higher than that of the Chinese team.
The last time the Danish team participated in the World Cup was in 2007, when they failed to qualify for the group stage. It is worth mentioning that the Chinese women's football team was in the same group as the Danish team and defeated their opponent 3-2. This time, after 16 years, the Danish team broke into the main match of the World Cup again. Therefore, in terms of the experience of participating in the World Cup, the Chinese women's football team has won the opponent, so psychologically we have an advantage. In recent years, the two teams have not played much. The most recent time was in the 2019 Algarve Cup. The Danish team beat the Chinese women's football team 1-0. The previous games were mostly before 2014, and the reference value is not big.
During this year’s World Cup preparation period, the Chinese women’s football team played a total of 9 warm-up matches. The team achieved 3 wins, 3 draws and 3 losses. Before coming to Australia, the Chinese women’s football team had two closed warm-up matches with the Russian women’s football team in Qingdao to determine the final list of 23 players. The Chinese team won the two games with a score of 1-0 and 2-1 respectively. After coming to Australia, the Chinese women’s football team played two warm-up matches with Brazil and Colombia respectively. In the end, the women’s football girls lost to Brazil 0-3. , 2-2 draw with Colombia.
After this series of games, the women's football lineup is basically determined. Shui Qingxia still uses 442 as the main formation. The goalkeeper will most likely be Zhu Yu as the starter. In the previous two warm-up matches, Wang Shanshan played as a striker against Brazil, and returned to the central defender against Colombia. The attribute of a swingman will confuse the Danish team's tactics.
There is a high probability that Zhang Linyan will lead the attack in the midfield, and Yang Lina and Zhang Rui have always been the main team of the Chinese team, and their positions will remain unchanged. The other midfielder is likely to be decided between Wang Shuang and Wu Chengshu. As for the forwards, the positions of Wang Shanshan and Zhang Linyan must be considered. If the former is pushed forward, Zhang Linyan will probably return to the left. If the latter is the forward, then the partner is likely to be Tang Jiali who is in good shape. In the battle against Denmark, I believe that the women's football team will put more energy into the offense and defense of set-pieces. Instructing Shui Qingxia to prepare for the game, set-piece tactics are also the top priority. It is worth mentioning that the two goals in the game against Colombia all came from set-piece tactics.
