Corinthians to face Arsenal in inaugural Women’s Champions Cup final
Alessia Russo scored a pair of second-half goals in a 10-minute span to cap a 6-0 victory for Arsenal over Moroccan club ASFAR on Wednesday for a spot in the final of the first Women’s Champions Cup. Arsenal will face Brazilian club Corinthians on Sunday in the title match of the intercontinental championship for club teams. Corinthians defeated Gotham FC 1-0 in Wednesday’s earlier match at Gtech Community Stadium.
Stina Blackstenius’ header went over the goal line in the eighth minute before it was kicked out by a defender, followed closely by Frida Maanum’s goal in the 12th to give Arsenal an early 2-0 lead. Mariona Caldentey converted a penalty in the 22nd and Olivia Smith’s late blast from the top of the box made it 4-0 at the break.
Russo came on as a substitute in the 61st minute and scored five minutes later before adding a second in the 76th minute. The African champions were unable to mount much of a challenge against Arsenal, which qualified for the tournament as winners of the Women’s Champions League.
In the earlier match, 40-year-old Gabi Zanotti stopped a cross on her chest, then shot the dropping ball with her left boot to the right of Gotham goalkeeper Ann-Katrin Berger, who got her hands to it but couldn’t stop it from slipping through in the 82nd minute.
National Women’s Soccer League club Gotham, which qualified for the inaugural FIFA event by winning the first CONCACAF Champions Cup, had pushed hard for the opener in the second half. But Corinthians, the Copa Libertadores champion, defended smartly and the Brazilian team made it count with the 38-year-old Tamires producing the cross for the oldest player on the field to score the goal that mattered.
Gotham made a desperate push for a late equaliser with Berger going up for a free kick deep in stoppage time, when one of the Corinthians backroom staff was sent off, presumably for calling too frenetically for the full-time whistle. Jaedyn Shaw sent the free kick to the right of the post in the last action of the game.
It was Gotham’s first competitive match since winning the NWSL championship as the eighth seed in November. Team captain Rose Lavelle went off injured in stoppage time. Both the final and third-place match are to be played Sunday at Arsenal’s stadium, with $2.3 million going to the winner of the competition. The runner-up takes home $1 million.
The six-team Champions Cup was created as an event for club teams. It builds on a growing number of regional club competitions, led by the success of the UEFA Women’s Champions League. Two continental champions were eliminated in earlier rounds: Auckland United from Oceania and Wuhan Chegu Jiangda from Asia.
