There was early joy for New Zealand when they grabbed a 1-0 lead.
Considering all the drama that has encircled them lately, the New Zealand women’s footballers turned in a performance to be proud of in their Olympic opener in Saint-Étienne today.
New Zealand, with a world ranking of 28, went down 2-1 to eighth-ranked Canada in their first pool match after a courageous, battling effort.
With the Olympics looming, the team’s coach, Jitka Klimková, stood down and was replaced by Michael Mayne.
Once they got to France, Ali Riley, the team’s captain and senior figure, was forced to withdraw because of injury and was replaced by Michaela Foster, with Katie Bowen stepping in to lead the side. Riley had been hoping to compete in her fifth successive Olympics.
As if that wasn’t enough, the New Zealand team got caught up in the bizarre drone drama, when some zealous Canadian officials used a drone to spy on the New Zealanders while they trained.
Amazingly, the New Zealanders dismissed all the distractions and in the 12th minute against Canada they took a shock 1-0 lead when Mackenzie Barry latched on to a corner and dispatched it into the top left area of the Canadian goal. The goal brought back memories of New Zealand’s opening match at last year’s Women’s World Cup, when they stunned highly favoured Norway.
However, the Canadians dominated proceedings after that early goal. The New Zealand defence held firm until the fourth minute of first half injury time, when Cloé Lacasse produced an equaliser.
In the first half, New Zealand had just the one shot at goal, whereas Canada had six, which pointed to the Canadians’ control.
There was more of the same in the second half and New Zealand goalie Anna Leat was forced to make some outstanding saves to keep her side in the game.
Finally, with 10 minutes remaining Canada turned all their possession into the winning goal when Evelyne Viens slotted the ball past Leat.
New Zealand’s next match is against Colombia on Monday morning (New Zealand time) in Lyon.