Feb. 23, 2007
SANTA CLARA, Calif. - Former Santa Clara women's soccer standouts Leslie Osborne (`05) and Aly Wagner (`02) were named to the U.S. Women's National team's 20-woman roster se to take part in the 2007 Algarve Cup, to be held March 7-14 in Portugal. Wagner will be seeing her first action of the new year with the team, while Osborne will be coming off of a strong performance with the American side in January's Four Nations Cup in China.
The Americans, who have been drawn into Group B at the prestigious tournament, will open play on March 7 against China, face Finland on March 9 and finish the first-round against Sweden on March 12. All the first round games are played at small venues spread out over the Algarve region on the southern coast of the country with all of the placement matches taking place on March 14. Fans can follow the USA's grueling schedule of four games in eight days online via ussoccer.com's MatchTracker and watch exclusive highlights from all_access video.
Group A features defending Algarve Cup champions Germany, as well as Norway, France and Denmark. Six of the eight teams in Groups A and B will be participating in the 2007 FIFA Women's World Cup in China come September, with only France and Finland missing out. Group C features Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Iceland.
This will be the 12th trip to the Algarve Cup for the U.S. women who, from 2003-2005, won an unprecedented three straight championships at what has become the world's most competitive women's international event outside of the Women's World Cup, the Olympics and the European Championship. At last year's Algarve Cup, the USA advanced to the championship game, but fell in penalty kicks to Germany to break its hold on the tournament.
