New Zealand have been drawn in Group B and will battle it out with Japan, Mexico and England to progress past the pool stages.
Here are 20 other things you need to know about the FIFA Women’s World Cup:
1. The FIFA Women’s World Cup Germany 2011 is the sixth tournament in its history. Germany will become only the second European country to host the FIFA Women’s World Cup, after Sweden in 1995. The USA and China PR are the only other previous hosts, each having staged the event twice.
2. The all-time attendance record was recorded at the FIFA Women’s World Cup USA 1999, when a total of 1,194,221 fans flocked to the stadiums, an average of more than 37,300. This figure was almost matched by the competition in China PR four years ago, which attracted only 4,000 fewer spectators.
3. Germany 2011 is likely to bring about yet another clash of the titans: Germany have won the last two FIFA Women’s World Cups while the USA took the very first title in 1991 and also triumphed in 1999, to date the only win on home soil. Norway, in 1995, are the only side to have broken the dominance of the two superpowers of women’s football.
4. Eight teams have participated in all five previous FIFA Women’s World Cup™ tournaments: Brazil, China PR, Germany, Japan, Nigeria, Norway, Sweden and the USA. China PR will be the only one missing in Germany 2011.
5. Germany’s Birgit Prinz tops the overall list of goalscorers, with 14 goals in four competitions.
6. The regulation time for matches at the 1991 FIFA Women’s World Cup was 80 minutes – two periods of 40 minutes. But the women obviously proved their stamina was just as good as the men’s as the competition regulations for the second tournament in 1995 were changed to 90 minutes – two periods of 45 minutes.
7. Despite having won four out of the five previous tournaments, Germany and the USA have never met in a FIFA Women’s World Cup™ final.
8. The USA are the only team to have reached the semi-final of all five editions of the FIFA Women’s World Cup.
9. The FIFA Women’s World Cup 1999 also set an attendance record for a single match, when a total of 90,185 spectators turned out to watch the USA beat China PR in the final at the Rose Bowl in Los Angeles.
10. Kristine Lilly (USA) is the only player to have played in all five editions of the FIFA Women’s World Cup. She is also the most-capped player, having appeared in 30 matches.
11. Ifeanyi Chiejine from Nigeria became the youngest player of all time when she took to the field against Denmark in 1999 at the tender age of 16 years and one month. More than twice Chiejine’s age, Meg from Brazil is still the oldest at 39 years and five months. She played against Sweden in the 1991 tournament.
12. Women’s football faces its own particular administrative challenges. In 2007, for example, it went unnoticed by FIFA that American defender Cat Reddick had married and subsequently been entered under the name of Cat Whitehill. The consequence was a duplicate in the FIFA database and quite a bit of confusion behind the scenes.
13. In 1991, Brazilian Claudia Vasconcelos became the first woman to officiate a match in a FIFA competition when she took charge of the play-off for third place between Sweden and Germany, which ended 4-0 in the Scandinavians’ favour.
14. The first-ever woman to coach a professional men’s team was Caroline Morace, who took over at the helm of Italian third-division club Viterbese in 1999. She is now coach of the Canada women’s team.
15. New Zealand’s Terry McCahill was the unfortunate player to first score an own goal in the FIFA Women’s World Cup. She scored the opener of what was to be Norway’s 4-0 victory over the Football Ferns on 19 November 1991.
16. Overall, women receive fewer cards than men. During the last tournament in 2007, the average number of bookings and expulsions was 2.41 and 0.06 compared to 3.83 and 0.27 in the 2010 edition of the men’s tournament.
17. In the last two editions of their respective World Cups, more headers were scored by women than men. In the 2007 FIFA Women’s World Cups, 18 per cent of goals were headers, compared to 17.9 per cent in the men’s 2010 edition. In the 2003 women’s competition, 23.3 per cent of goals were headers, compared to 18.3 per cent in the men’s 2006 edition.
18. Leonardo Cuellar is the only coach in the history of the FIFA Women’s World Cup to have also played in the men’s tournament. The Mexico coach appeared as a midfielder for Mexico in three matches of the 1978 FIFA World Cup.
19. 1995 winners Norway hold the record for the most consecutive FIFA World Cup wins when they achieved ten straight victories between 1991 and 1999 – a record that will take some beating. Four years ago, England prevented Germany from doing so when they drew 0-0 at the group stage.
20. Since the start of the FIFA Women’s World Cup, there have been 44 head-to-heads between teams with male and female coaches. The women lead the scoreboard with 28 wins (63.6 per cent), five draws and 11 defeats. The first female coach to win a match was Sweden’s Gunilla Paijkull in 1991.
Story courtesy of FIFA.com.
For more on the world game go to www.fifa.com