United States’ Alex Morgan heads the ball agasint Haiti during the U.S. Women’s World Cup victory tour, Sunday, September 20, 2015, in Birmingham, Ala.
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Carli Lloyd had her second straight three-goal game to lead the United States to an 8-0 victory over Haiti on Sunday in a friendly.
Lloyd closed out the half with two goals to complete her hat trick and in doing so became just the fifth American player with five global hat tricks, joining Mia Hamm, Cindy Parlow, Abby Wambach and Michelle Akers.
In the first game of the double-header, the USA beat Haiti 5-0.
The win pushed its unbeaten streak at home to 100 consecutive games (88-0-12). The first came in the 51st minute from Amy Rodriguez from outside the box. She has scored 14 goals in the last eight matches for the U.S.
One minute later Crystal Dunn put in her second goal in as many games after receiving a brilliant through ball from Megan Rapinoe. Her grandmother recently passed away. She now has three this year, following up on her astounding World Cup final performance in which she scored three in the first 16 minutes. She is an out-and-out goal scorer, so I think what we’re seeing is just her fitting into a natural position.
Julie Johnston started the scoring less than a minute in, and Lloyd had her hat trick by minute 39, which included a penalty kick. She got the entire second half off, along with four other starters, but there was every reason to coast through the first half, too. The lack of a competitive matchup took an edge of this back-to-back matches, however, the fans in Detroit and Birmingham stocked the stands and, for the US team, the youthful Haitian squad allowed USA coach Jill Ellis to have some fun. She’s so mentally strong. The USA had 39 shots, Haiti didn’t have any. She’s a very competent player.
“For girls, I mean, it’s showing them that they have this great opportunity in front of them to continue playing soccer, making a dream out of it, playing professional soccer and possibly being on this team one day”.
“It’s been remarkable because, obviously, yeah, she’s not only played with her club, she’s done appearances”, Ellis said. “We scored a lot of goals and people will remember that, but to me, what I’ll remember most is spending time in front of my family”.
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With versatility important on smaller Olympic rosters, and Tobin Heath unable to play because of an ankle injury, Ellis said she just wanted to see how it went (not surprisingly, Sauerbrunn, who helped set up Lloyd’s second goal with a run forward, looked more than capable in her lone half). It’s all good. I can’t complain.
