The women's association football tournament at the 2008 Summer Olympics was held in Beijing and four other cities in the People's Republic of China from 6 to 21 August. Associations affiliated with FIFA were invited to send their full women's national teams.
For these Games, the women competed in a 12-team tournament. Preliminary matches commenced on 6 August, two days before the Opening Ceremony of the Games. The teams were grouped into three pools of four teams each for a round-robin preliminary round. The top two teams in each pool, as well as the best two third-place finishing teams, advanced to an eight-team single-elimination bracket.
The tournament was won by the United States, which beat Brazil 1–0 in the gold medal game. Carli Lloyd scored the game-winning goal in the 96th minute for the United States, which collected their third Olympic gold medal.
Qualifying
A National Olympic Committee may enter one women's team for the football competition.
Means of completion Date of completion Venue Berths Qualified Host nation – – 1 AFC Preliminary Competition February 2007 – August 2007 – 2 CAF Preliminary Competition October 2006 – March 2008 – 1 CONCACAF Preliminary Competition October 2007 – April 2008 Ciudad Juárez 2 2006 Sudamericano Femenino 10–26 November 2006 Mar del Plata 1 OFC Women's Olympic Qualifying 25 August – 7 September 20078 March 2008 Apia Port Moresby 1 UEFA (2007 FIFA Women's World Cup)* 10–30 September 2007 2* UEFA Playoff (Denmark vs Sweden) 8 November 200728 November 2007 Viborg Solna 1* CONMEBOL–CAF play-off 19 April 2008 Beijing 1 TOTAL 12
Note – The three best ranked European teams at the FIFA Women's World Cup qualified for the Olympics. However, the third best team England could not participate, because England competes at the Olympic Games as part of Great Britain, which does not compete in football. Therefore, the fourth European team would advance, requiring a play-off between Sweden and Denmark.
Venues
The tournament was held in five venues across five cities:
BeijingShanghaiTianjinWorkers' StadiumShanghai StadiumTianjin Olympic Centre StadiumCapacity: 70,161Capacity: 80,000Capacity: 60,000ShenyangQinhuangdaoShenyang Olympic StadiumQinhuangdao Olympic Sports Centre StadiumCapacity: 60,000Capacity: 33,000
Seeding Pot 1: Asia Pot 2: North America and Africa Pot 3: Europe Pot 4: South America and Oceania (Hosts)
Squads
The women's tournament is a full international tournament with no restrictions on age. Each nation must submit a squad of 18 players by 23 July 2008. A minimum of two goalkeepers (plus one optional alternate goalkeeper) must be included in the squad.
Match officials
+ Referees Confederation Referee AFC Hong Eun-ah (South Korea) Pannipar Kamnueng (Thailand) Niu Huijun (China PR) CAF Deidre Mitchell (South Africa) CONCACAF Shane de Silva (Trinidad and Tobago) Dianne Ferreira-James (Guyana) Kari Seitz (United States) CONMEBOL Estela Álvarez (Argentina) UEFA Christine Beck (Germany) Dagmar Damková (Czech Republic) Jenny Palmqvist (Sweden) Nicole Petignat (Switzerland)
+ Assistant referees Confederation Assistant referee AFC Daw Kaw Ja (Myanmar) Sarah Ho (Australia) Jacqueline Leleu (Australia) Liu Hongjuan (China PR) Liu Hsiu-mei (Chinese Taipei) Widiya Habibah Shamsuri (Malaysia) CAF Nomvula Masilela (South Africa) Tempa Ndah (Benin) CONCACAF Mayte Chávez (Mexico) Marlene Duffy (United States) Milena López (Costa Rica) Cindy Mohammed (Trinidad and Tobago) Rita Muñoz (Mexico) Veronica Perez (United States) CONMEBOL Marlene Leyton (Peru) María Rocco (Argentina) UEFA Helen Caro (Sweden) Cristina Cini (Italy) Irina Mirt (Romania) Inka Müller (Germany) Katarzyna Nadolska (Poland) Hege Lanes Steinlund (Norway) María Luisa Villa Gutiérrez (Spain) Karine Vives Solana (France)
Group stage Group winners and runners-up, plus two best third place teams advanced to quarter final round. Groups are lettered sequentially from the last letter in the Men's Football tournament (which has Groups A through D).
All times are China Standard Time (UTC+8)
Group E
Group F
Group G
Ranking of third-placed teams
Knockout stage
Quarter-finals
Semi-finals
Bronze medal match
Gold medal match
Statistics
Goalscorers
Assists
FIFA Fair Play Award China PR won the FIFA Fair Play Award, given to the team with the best record of fair play during the tournament. Every match in the final competition is taken into account but only teams that reach the second stage of the competition are eligible for the Fair Play Award.
Team 1 956 2 939 3 930 4 913 5 913 6 903 7 896 8 892
Tournament ranking
References
External links Olympic Football Tournaments Beijing 2008 - Women, FIFA.com RSSSF Summary
FIFA Technical Report