USA thrash 13 past Thailand ahead of France return to action

The United States started its defense trophy with a dazzling style with 13-0 in the Women's World Cup, defeating Thailand in a ruthless show of strength against potential quarterfinal opponents and host France, who will return to action on Wednesday against Norway.

The three-time US champion UU UU He scored 10 goals in the second half in Reims on Tuesday, as he overcame Germany's 11-0 victory over Argentina in 2007 and destroyed his own previous tournament, the best of 7-0.

Alex Morgan was the star with five goals, Rose Lavelle and Samantha Mewis each scored twice and Lindsey Horan, Megan Rapinoe, Mallory Pugh and Carli Lloyd also scored in an embarrassing Group F encounter watched by more than 18,000.

The Americans responded to the blow after suggestions that they could have eased and saved Thailand in 34th place of total humiliation.

"This is a world championship, so all the teams that are here have been fantastic to get to this point, to be respectful with opponents is to play hard against opponents," said the United States coach. UU Jill Ellis.

We will take it

Morgan, who now has 106 goals for his country, equaled a record set by his compatriot Michelle Akers by scoring five times in a World Cup game.

"We always want to have a world record and anything we can overcome the Germans, we will take," joked Rapinoe.

Morgan and Rapinoe are among the biggest stars of a team that has made waves with their highly publicized fight for equal pay that led them to file a lawsuit against the United States Soccer Federation in March, accusing the organization of gender discrimination.

"Our players were waiting for this moment and they were really disappointed," Thailand coach Nuengruethai Sathongwien said. "We have no excuse and we accept that they are better."

If EE. UU He leads the group, they could be on a collision course to play against Corinne Diacre's France in the quarterfinals in Paris.

The hosts won a 4-0 victory over South Korea in their first outing last Friday and we hope to take advantage of that when they face Norway in Nice in Group A on Wednesday night (1900 GMT) in one of 13 grueling games, confirmed FIFA, with more than one million tickets sold.

Norway's Scandinavian neighbors, Sweden, began their World Cup campaign with a 2-0 victory over Chile in Rennes on Tuesday, but only after a delay due to a violent storm.

The players retired for around 40 minutes in the second half with the game 0-0 before Sweden got the victory thanks to the final goals of Kosovare Asllani and substitute Madelen Janogy.

Marozsan's toe

"The interruption definitely bothers us." We did not want it to end 0-0, so we wanted to come back and decide the game, and I think we deserve the three points, "said Asllani.

Sweden will face Thailand later in Group F, while Chile will face the United States in Paris on Sunday.

The European champions, the Netherlands, beat New Zealand 1-0 at Le Havre in Pool E thanks to a goal from Jill Roord at the time of the stoppage.

Germany coach Martina Voss-Tecklenburg revealed that star player Dzsenifer Marozsan could miss the rest of the tournament after being excluded from Wednesday's Group B clash with Spain (1600 GMT) due to a broken foot.

"We will try to get him back on the field before the tournament ends, but we can not make predictions," said Voss-Tecklenburg, who described the 27-year-old as "irreplaceable."

On Wednesday they will also face Nigeria and South Korea in Grenoble (1300 GMT), and both will try to recover from the initial defeats.