By Jim Hearson
- Regular readers will be familiar with Jim’s series, where he looks at the winners of various competitions and imagines how those sides might have looked if numbered 1-11. As the Women’s World Cup reaches the business end, he’s back with a look at the prevous winners
During the last Women’s World Cup, we looked into some of the oddities of squad numbering during the tournament, so we figured that this time we’d go the whole hog and seek to 1-to-11-ify the winners as we have done for previous men’s tournaments.
Giving that the jamboree in France four years ago wasn’t a one-off in terms of atypical numbering practices, this could be quite the expedition, so buckle up and let’s head back to the early 1990s, when football began.
1991: Norway 1 USA 2
Anyone who’s watched a bit of women’s football will know that there’s a lot more positional versatility from players than in the men’s game, and that explains why USA’s number 9 Mia Hamm – usually a striker – lined up on the right side of defence.
Away from that, the US college system has to take a lot of the blame – regardless of gender, they generally don’t kowtow to numbering conventions, and it’s likely that many of the players here just retained their college numbers – something that spread globally during the growth period in the women’s game when getting a US college scholarship was the best way to progress in football.
Anyway, to fixing it and we only have three players to work with. Joy Biefield can enjoy a reverse Zamorano not just because she played alongside Hamm, but she’s 5’5”, currently aged 55 and scored 55 goals during her college career. Kristine Lilly can take 6, given she’s a central midfielder, but it’s a shame she isn’t 6’6” – that said, she is a giant of the USWNT with a mammoth 354 caps and 130 goals. That leaves Carin Jennings to take the leftover 7 shirt, which works for a wide forward.
1995: Norway 2 Germany 0
On the face of it, the Norwegians’ line-up for the second Women’s World Cup final made a lot of numerical sense, although the shimmying around of some of the players from the first suggests that it was more by good fortunate, rather than the players being keen on particular numbers.
In 1991, Tina Svensson wore 16, Gro Espeseth had 4 and Hege Riise sported 9, but four years later, they donned 2, 3 and 6, respectively. There were some holdouts though, with Tone Haugen and Linda Medalen retaining 7 and 10, respectively, from the tournament in China.
So, to remedying the 1995 iteration, and once you’ve given Marianne Pettersen the 9 shirt that should be worn by someone in the forward line, that just leaves 8 for Merete Myklebust. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than flipping the two around.
1999: USA 0 China 0 (aet, USA win 5-4 on penalties)
A lot can happen in eight years – USA can storm back to the final, win again and in Brandi Chastain create one of football’s most iconic images. People can also get married and change positions, which means undoing some of our carefully laid plans from the 1991 edition.
We’re talking specifically about Joy Fawcett, née Biefield, who could easily retain the 5 shirt we gave her last time out, but doing so would have a ripple effect on the rest of the team that just doesn’t sit right, so sorry Joy – you played at right-back in 1999, so you can wear 2. Marriages can end, too – Michelle Akers-Stahl was back to being Michelle Akers and she moved from attack to midfield but kept 10.
Unfortunately, the shirt that Chastain swung around her head had 6 on it, so Kristine Lilly will need an alternative this time, and while 7 and 8 are both options, we need them further forward for Tiffeny Milbrett and Cindy Parlow ahead of her. That means the best we can do for Lilly this time is 5 – something of a cult number for central midfielders – leaving Kate Sobrero to take the vacant 3.
2003: Germany 2 Sweden 1 (golden goal)
Oh Germany, what happened to you? Despite losing the final in 1995, you won our hearts. The starting team had ten 1-11 players in it (albeit with some questionable positioning) and you had all of the 1-11 for 33 minutes of the game after their first substitution. Now you do this to us?
That 1995 team lined up with 2, 3 and 5 at the back, something we can recreate here. Kerstin Stegemann already has 2, so Stefanie Gottschlich can take 3 on the opposite flank, while Ariane Hingst can wear 5, mainly so Sandra Minnert can reverse Zamorano and take 4.
Further forward, Kerstin Garefrekes opted for 18 in multiple tournaments, so she can wear 8 here, given she seems to have an affinity with the digit, meaning that Maren Meinert can assume the 11 shirt of her initial-sake, Martina Muller. Quite apt, given that the first tournament was played for the M&M Cup.
