Spain W vs Netherlands W prediction: WORLD: World Cup Women – Play Offs betting tips on match 2023-08-10 01:00.
Questions were raised in the Spain camp after ending their group campaign with a 4-0 drubbing at the hands of Japan. Even so, La Roja ultimately silenced their critics with the perfect response, a 5-1 win over Switzerland to reach the FIFA Women’s World Cup (WWC) quarter-finals for the very first time. Seasoned striker Esther González admitted that “this was our objective”, although they’ll surely be setting their sights even higher now.
This is just Spain’s third attempt at a WWC tournament, and with improvement in each passing edition, their imperious ten-game form (W9, L1) and three-game winning run against the Netherlands may inspire belief of a maiden semi-final appearance. Not ones to spare their opponents’ feelings, Spain have seen multi-goal margins in each of their last nine victories, which includes an incredible 22-1 combined scoreline across their previous four!
The 2-0 scoreline in the Netherlands’ last 16 victory over South Africa in which they scored their eighth and ninth unanswered goals may suggest it was a classic case of Dutch dominance. Quite the contrary, as it was goalkeeper Daphne van Domselaar who stood firm in the face of 14 shots, two more than the Dutch managed, to keep her third clean sheet from four appearances at the tournament.
In front of that domineering defence is a highly capable strike force, with the Oranje heading into this heavyweight encounter on the back of a six-game unbeaten run (W5, D1), with three of those games seeing them bag at least four goals. Much like Spain, this is also the Netherlands’ third WWC tournament, but if they’re to set any records they will need to win the entire thing to one-up their final defeat back in 2019!
Players to watch: Aitana BonmatĂ was like a woman possessed as she directly contributed to four goals in Spain’s last 16 success (G2, A2), and that was actually the second time she’s completed that personal feat in 2023! Trying to outdo her will be Golden Boot hopeful Jill Roord. The Wolfsburg star was on the losing side against BonmatĂ’s Barcelona in the Women’s UEFA Champions League final earlier this year, but has an impressive four goals from eight shots on target at this tournament.
Hot stat: Just one of the last 11 sides to face the Netherlands stopped them from scoring before half-time.