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Christiane Endler’s Sensational Saves Steal The Show Even Though USA Beat Chile 3-0 At Women’s World Cup

By Jonathan Vankin
Published on: 07:45 PST, Jun 16, 2019

After Team USA opened their 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup with a record-setting, 13-0 blowout of a hapless Thailand team making its World Cup debut, as Inquisitr reported, the American women appeared to be on their way to another lopsided scoreline against a second overmatched opponent and World Cup debutante in the Chile national women’s side. After the first 45-minute half, Team USA already had a 3-0 lead.

But there was one obstacle standing in their way of another massive goal total — the Chilean goalkeeper, 27-year-old, six-foot-tall Christiane Endler, who as Deadspin.com put it, served as a “goal stopping machine,” especially in the second half, when the leaky Chile defense put Endler on the spot repeatedly, only to see their team captain stifle any Team USA attempts to find the back of the net again.

Endler’s seemingly supernatural ability to get in the way of any shot the USA women fired at the Chile net appeared to get so far inside the heads of the Americans that she was seemingly able to stop goal scoring opportunities without touching the ball. When USA was awarded a penalty shot in the 81st minute, Carli Lloyd — who earlier became the first Team USA player to score in six consecutive World Cup matches, as CBS Sports reported — sent the shot wide to the right of the net.

Earlier, Endler miraculously stopped a header from USA forward Christen Press that seemed like certain goal, as seen in the video below.

Though the USA scored three in the first half, it perhaps should have been four, but Endler somehow prevented what would have been an own-goal that should have opened the scoring.

She also denied a spectacular volley from Press in the 58th minute.

She capped off the sensational performance by psyching out Lloyd on the 81st-minute penalty.

Endler plays professional soccer in France with the Paris Saint-Germain women’s team, but when Endler was a child in Chile, she says, she not only never dreamed she would play in a World Cup, she did not even realize that high-level competition in women’s soccer existed, according to an interview she gave to CNN.

“I never imagined reaching so far because I didn’t even know that important women’s football (championships) existed,” she told CNN. “In Chile we never had a reference in women’s football, somebody who had left and tried their luck outside. There was very little that was known.”

Endler played college soccer in the United States, spending two seasons at the University of South Florida, according to The Charlotte Observer, where she racked up 170 saves, sixth-most in the school’s history.

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