Spain and the United States are the two most recent Women’s World Cup winners. They faced off in a pair of international friendlies this past week. Spain beat the hosts in Washington, D.C., 2-0, on Saturday and drew 2-2 in Chester, Pennsylvania on Tuesday. Both games sold out.
It is too early to tell whether the two-match showdown between the world-ranked No. 1 Spain, the defending World Cup champ, and No. 2 USA marked an official changing of the guard. The teams may be on a collision course at the 2027 FIFA Women’s World Cup next summer.
It did provide the USWNT with a stern test — one Emma Hayes’ team met with mixed results.
“In order to defend well against [Spain], you have to do it well as a collective. In order to attack well against them, you have to do it well as a collective,” Hayes told reporters during the lead-up to the pair of friendlies.
“It’s about the whole midfield, the collective,” she penned as a guest columnist for The Guardian. “Spain will find positional and numerical superiority in whichever way they can, because doing so has been deeply ingrained from very early ages and they are the masters of time and space on a football pitch.”
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