International Break Roundup: Las Blancas

CD Tacon, and Liga Iberdrola alike, took a brief break this week thanks to the international window. Four of our players received call-ups from their nations:

Lorena Navarro

• While Lorena had been called up for the U-17 team previously, this was her first call up with the U-20s.

• Spain’s U-20 team had two friendlies this break – against Russia (11/7) and against France (11/9). Unfortunately, Lorena didn’t get any minutes during the 2-0 victory against Russia. She did see some minutes in the 2-0 victory over France when she was subbed in during the 85^th minute.

Daiane

• Brazil participated in the Yongchuan Tournament in Chongqing, China. This is an invite-only tournament that consists of four teams. It’s happened every year since 2015 and China has won four out of the five tournaments. Brazil is the only team to have won besides China, and that was back in 2017. For whatever reason, this time around Thaisa wasn’t called up.
• Brazil’s first game was a 4-0 win over Canada on November 4th. Daiane didn’t get any minutes in that game, but the victory was a substantial one thanks to a brace from her teammate Bia, and individual goals from Chú and Formiga. Their win over Canada moved them into the finals and sent Canada into the third place game, which they won.
• The final was against China and Daiane saw the full 90 minutes. The game was tied through the final minute. Unfortunately, Brazil lost out in penalties due to misses by Tamires and Andressinha.

Kosovare Asllani, Sofia Jakobsson

• It comes as no surprise to any of us that these two were called up. Both players have been fixtures on Sweden’s senior national team for a while now. Unlike last international break, Sweden only played one game this time around. This time, it was a 3-2 loss against the US. Both women played in it, but Kosovare Asllani left the game in the 64^th minute. Neither got assists this time around, but their teammate Anna Anvegård made it close with her brace.
• For these two, the game wasn’t the only thing that happened in this international break. As Om Arvind covered, Asllani won Sweden’s Forward of the Year for the second time around. She and Sofia Jakobsson were also nominees for the Diamantbollen which went to Caroline Seger.

CD Tacon will be back on Sunday, November 17 at 4 AM Mountain Time for their first match in Lezama against Athletic Club. Since this is another away match, I wouldn’t get my hopes up too much about getting to see it streamed somewhere.