England hang on at the death to progress to the semi-finals of the Women’s World Cup thanks to goals from Lauren Hemp and Alessia Russo in their 2-1 quarter-final win over Colombia.

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The final four of the Women’s World Cup are on the horizon for either England or Colombia as these two group winners face off at the Sydney Football Stadium this morning (kick-off is at 11:30 AM GMT.)

Both sides navigated their respective round of sixteen matchups, although neither of the games were convincing by any stretch of the imagination.

The Lionesses overcame tough competition from the Super Falcons of Nigeria as Sarina Wiegman’s team ran out 4-2 winners on penalties after a scoreless draw after extra time.

England will feel the impact of that hard-fought win against the top side in Africa, with Lauren James receiving a two-match ban for an ill-advised ‘stamp’ on Michelle Alozie.

The red card was justified on the night as it was a moment of madness by the England star, but the two-game seemed slightly excessive for an incident that was originally a yellow card in real-time.

If England are to win this game against Colombia, James will be missing a potential meeting with either Australia or France in the semi-final stage – which could be a tournament-defining moment for one of the pre-World Cup favourites.

However, Colombia would be incredibly frustrated about the conversations of who might be missing for England’s potential semi-final, as Colombia have already beaten one of the top teams in the tournament, Germany, in the group stages. 

Affectionately known as Las Chicas Superpoderosas (or The Powerpuff Girls), Colombia provided their fans with all things nice in the group stages by topping the group and notching an historic win over the aforementioned Germany in the process.

In Ireland, we were introduced to Colombia in a spicy pre-tournament friendly which was called off after twenty minutes as a result of a Denise O’Sullivan injury and what the FAI described as an “overly physical” warm-up game.

The rest of the tournament sees them as the side that might make a fairytale run to the final, and the Colombians certainly have the quality to cause England some problems.

Their round-of-sixteen clash with Jamaica was decided by a beautiful goal by Catalina Usme, with the experienced international controlling a diagonal ball well in the box before creating space to fire Colombia into the quarter-finals.

England will be expected to progress to the final eight against either the hosts Australia or European rivals France, but with the list of absentees growing longer the further the Lionesses progress in the competition Colombia will feel that they are there for the taking.

Colombia will be playing in their first-ever Women’s World Cup quarter-finals and the path to the semi-finals, although not straightforward, is with view.

A wonderful touch and finish from Catalina Usme helped Colombia beat Jamaica to advance for the World Cup QF for the first time. 

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In the year they made their debut on the World Cup stage, Morocco qualified for the last 16 stage, Anissa Lahmari the goal scorer and hero, Germany only taking a point to send them through as runners up.

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A Vanegas header deep into injury time gave Colombia victory over Germany and a strong hold of Group H at the World Cup.

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