When you consider it, even the personal purpose was spectacular.
Sure, Spain scored fives occasions in its 5-1 victory towards Switzerland on Saturday to advance to the quarterfinals of the World Cup. Sure, the objectives had are available all kinds, a veritable tapas menu of the right way to put the ball within the internet: nifty passing, fancy footwork, opportunistic finishes.
However even the personal purpose, the one which Spain defender Laia Codina needs she had again, the one which ensured that Switzerland’s humbling exit from the World Cup was not a shutout, was a looker — a easy end through which Codina caught her personal goalkeeper out of place and beat her cleanly from close to midfield.
It was a self-inflicted wound, however not a lethal one. Spain was again on high six minutes later due to Alba Redondo.
Aitana Bonmatí made it 3-1 with some wonderful footwork that left at the very least two Swiss defenders mendacity on the grass round her. Codina atoned for her personal purpose with one into the proper internet simply earlier than halftime, and Jenni Hermoso pounced on an errant backpass to make it 5 halfway by the second half.
However Spain knew it was over lengthy earlier than that. It should transfer on, to face the winner of Sunday’s Netherlands-South Africa sport within the quarterfinals, the most recent step in a reconstruction undertaking that started after the workforce almost broke aside in a mutiny towards its coach, Jorge Vilda, final 12 months. That undertaking now will proceed for at the very least yet one more sport, and with the gamers brimming with confidence.
The victory was the workforce’s first within the knockout rounds of the key match. Given how complete it was, it won’t be its final on this World Cup.
