Republic of Ireland Women's behind-closed-doors game with Colombia on Friday was called off after 20 minutes for being "overly physical"; Denise O'Sullivan was taken to hospital with a shin injury; the midfielder didn't sustain a fracture
Saturday 15 July 2023 20:35, UK
Republic of Ireland Women's head coach Vera Pauw says her players "feared for themselves" in the abandoned World Cup warm-up against Colombia.
Midfielder Denise O'Sullivan was taken to hospital with a shin injury and the game was halted after just 20 minutes following a number of rough challenges, with the Football Association of Ireland describing it as "overly physical".
Scans have revealed the North Carolina Courage captain has not sustained any fractures, but the full extent of the soft tissue injury has still to be discovered.
"It was something I had never experienced before in my 47 years being involved in football, not as a player, not as a coach," Pauw told Sky Sports.
"It started lively, a good game, normal, and then the atmosphere built up to becoming over physical.
"Then there came a huge challenge on Denise, a challenge not within the rules of the game and she was in awful pain.
"I went to the coach of Colombia and I said: 'I need help from you, we need to calm this down. We all want to go to the World Cup'.
"The players were extremely upset and had fear for themselves. We are not a team who fear tackles or challenges.
"I took them away to calm things down, brought them to the bench. We discussed it and there was contact with the president and the CEO of the FAI.
"Collectively we knew it would not come right any more and if it went on we would put our players into a potentially-serious situation.
"We had a calm discussion with the ref and they called off the game."
Ireland open their World Cup campaign against Australia and Pauw remains optimistic O'Sullivan will be fit.
"We have hopes she can make the game, but we need to see, the first 48 hours are very important in these soft tissue injuries," she added, with the player later giving a short update on her injury, saying: "Hey everyone, Denise here, I just want to say a big thank you for all your love and support. I really appreciate it."
The Colombian Football Federation (FCF) released a statement which said while the training of its teams was "framed within the rules of the game, healthy competition and fair play", it respected Ireland's decision.
"The Colombian Football Federation informs that the friendly match... between the Colombia women's national team and Ireland was suspended because the Irish national team preferred not to continue playing when 23 minutes of the first
half had elapsed," said the statement from the FCF, which has been contacted for further comment.
They are just girls, one little foul and they started complaining.
However, Colombia midfielder Daniela Caracas later accused the Republic players of whinging, telling fans after the game in quotes published in the Irish Times: "They are just girls, one little foul and they started complaining.
"They were having a chat amongst themselves to continue or not, so we weren't going to hang around waiting for them.
"Let them eat s***."
The group stage will begin on July 20 and run over a two-week period finishing on August 3 and see group winners and runners-up progress to the round of 16, which takes place from August 5 to August 8.
The quarter-finals, which will be held in Wellington, Auckland, Brisbane and Sydney, are scheduled for August 11 and 12.
The first semi-final will then be played on August 15 in Auckland, with the other semi-final taking place on August 16 at the Accor Stadium in Sydney, which will then host the final on August 20.
A third-place play-off will be played the day before the final on August 19 in Brisbane.
