France vs Canada Saturday July 23rd (& Canada vs China July 20th)

[The Ref]

Lawrence and Matheson had a great game, not so Labbe once more time.  Sinclair was just on the field.

[rkomar]

How many times did Sinclair have the ball?  Not many, if my memory is right.  I would guess that she was so well marked, that it was hard to get the ball to her.  That leaves opportunities for the other players, especially Beckie.  So, I think that Sinclair contributes, even when she's not on the ball.  Replace her with someone who commands less respect, and everyone else will suffer.

I agree about Matheson having a good game.  The French impressed me with their ability to guess where players were going to pass and intercepting the ball.  That worked well against the younger players, but I seem to recall that Matheson was mostly wise to it.

[nstarsfan]

Sinclair had the ball a decent number of times but always passed to someone else.  While this is somewhat useful, opponents need to believe she will attack and shoot or she won't be as effective at pulling defenders away.  Otherwise, play her at MF and let Rose play forward.

[Sinc_Tanc_Olympic_Action]

Question for you guys: Remember Sinclair's free kick attempt in this game?  Was that a fair miss?  I thought she was the FK specialist and this would be something she could've easily converted if she was still 28 or 29 years old,  Maybe I'm asking this because she isn't the same player she used to be but I just don't know if this is a fair miss or not.

[nstarsfan]

I don't think ability on set plays diminishes.  My sense is this is a confidence issue.  For some reason, she seems less confident in her finishing ability and is not shooting as much.  Unless somehow this calf issue has knocked her form off in shooting and she hasn't quite gotten it back.