Japan edges event hosts Australia 1-0 in the Girls’s Asian Cup closing to say third title in 4 editions.
Printed On 21 Mar 2026
Maika Hamano scored the one aim as a formidable Japan battled previous Australia to clinch a 3rd Girls’s Asian Cup title in entrance of a record-breaking 74,357 followers in Sydney.
The Tottenham star hit a surprising long-range strike within the seventeenth minute at Stadium Australia to interrupt Australian hearts and add to their continental crowns from 2014 and 2018.
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These finals have been additionally towards Australia and ended 1-0.
The edge-of-the-seat decider culminated a landmark event with greater than 350,000 followers via the turnstiles, reinforcing the expansion in reputation of the ladies’s sport.
This was about six instances as many because the earlier event document set in 2010 in China, with the ultimate setting a brand new attendance document for a single sport in event historical past.
The Asian Cup doubled as qualifying for the World Cup in Brazil subsequent yr, with Australia, Japan, South Korea, China, North Korea and the Philippines all punching their tickets.
The Japanese workforce, stacked with English-based gamers, was invincible of their run to the ultimate, fluid throughout the park, and defending properly, steamrolling everybody in entrance of them.
Whereas Australia proved a a lot more durable take a look at, nothing might cease them as they accrued 29 objectives and conceded only one via their six event video games to bolster their standing as Asia’s primary workforce.
Japan named an unchanged lineup from their 4-1 semifinal thumping of South Korea.
Australia made one change to the workforce that beat defending champions China 2-1 within the final 4 with Wini Heatley most well-liked in central defence to Clare Hunt.
The hosts have been composed initially, trying to dictate the sport, and Caitlin Foord ought to have scored on 11 minutes when Mary Fowler threaded a cross via contained in the field.
However the unmarked Arsenal striker despatched her shot straight into the arms of Japan keeper Ayaka Yamashita to overlook a golden alternative.
It proved expensive with Japan breaking the impasse six minutes later when Tottenham midfielder Hamano collected the ball exterior the penalty space and unleashed a 25-yard rocket that discovered the highest nook.
Foord had one other probability when she pounced on a sloppy clearance from Yamashita, however failed to search out the goal from a decent angle, then scuffed one other vast simply earlier than the break.
Japan have been all the time a risk, and West Ham’s Riko Ueki went shut twice in as many minutes quickly after the restart.
With the sport on a knife-edge, Australia threw every thing they’d at Japan in a determined try to search out an equaliser as the group noise reached fever pitch.
Alanna Kennedy virtually pulled off a late equaliser within the 88th minute, however regardless of intense stress, Japan have been rock stable and absorbed the risk to cling on for the win.
