Two games. Two wins. The U.S. Women’s National Team continued their Group G play in the 2016 Rio Olympics Saturday with a gritty 1-0 win over France. It was a match that featured four Thorns FC in the respective starting XI’s—Tobin Heath, Allie Long and Meghan Klingenberg for the USWNT and Amandine Henry for France. Thorns midfielder Lindsey Horan also played, coming into the match in the 82nd minute.
Heath had a hand, or more precisely foot, in the all-important game-winning goal as her hard-angled blast in the 63rd minute hit the post and skittered to a wide open Carli Lloyd who hammered it home. It was Heath’s second assist in as many games—both of them helping Lloyd to goals. The victory put the Americans atop Group G and in the driver’s seat for a no. 1 seed heading into the quarterfinals.
“It was an awesome team performance,” said Heath after the match. “The fact that we got three points was huge. Being on top of this group, especially against an opponent like France, too, which is just a fantastic team.”
The relentless tournament pace continues, however, as the USWNT fly to Manaus to take on Colombia in the last game of the group stage on Tuesday (3pm PT, NBCOlympics.com). Though the team is sitting in first place, Heath believes her squad still has a lot of work to do in the final match.
“We’re going to have to make sure we focus extra hard on our recovery doing everything,” she said of the short time between matches. “Because it’s the third game; it matters, even though that we’re sitting on top of this group, we still have to make sure that we seal the deal and complete what we came here to do.”
And they’re not taking Colombia lightly. Though they beat the South American side 7-0 in a friendly in April—a game that saw fellow Thorns FC teammate Long open her USWNT account with a brace—Heath believes all bets are off in the Olympics.
“[Colombia] can be a tricky opponent and can cause some problems. So now we just have to continue to do the things we’ve been working on, stay well organized and all that and just stick to our own game plan and finish top two how we wanted to.
“In that way, I think we’ll be in the best position that we can be in.”
