Westfield U16 Women's team go through unbeaten
The Westfield U16 Women's team has ended the qualifying process for the AFC U17 Women's Championship undefeated, after beating Thailand 2-0 in Kuala Lumpur tonight.
Second half goals from Emily Van Egmond and Tara Andrews sealed the win in an entertaining match.
Australia dominated the first half against the skilful Thais, but found the goals much harder to come by than they had in their previous matches and they went into the break still level.
Andrews, Samantha Kerr, van Egmond, Nicole Bolger were all dangerous, with many attempts on goal, but the Thai keeper was in good form.
In the 42nd minute, Australia thought they had good claims for a penalty when Andrews and the Thai keeper collided, but the referee waved away the appeals.
Four minutes into the second half the breakthrough finally came, with Andrews heading a cross from Samantha Kerr into the path of van Egmond, who smashed into the empty net.
Andrews then sealed the win with 11 minutes remaining, when she pounced on a rebound, after the Thai keeper had saved a shot from Caitlin Foord.
The win saw the girls win all four of their matches in the difficult conditions, scoring 43 goals and not conceding a single goal.
Coach Gary Phillips while very happy with the results, was pleased that the final game was a difficult encounter, as next year's Asian Cup will be a much more difficult expedition against much stronger teams.
"This tournament has provided the players with their first experience of playing in Asia and has given some invaluable opportunities to develop the playing structure of the team," he said.
"The team's style of play has earned much praise from the spectators, and I am sure this young team can develop further into a unit which will be feared by the other finalists."
More details to follow later.