This Sunday, July 9, at 5:00 p.m. PST, Angel City hosts the North Carolina Courage in the two teams' second meeting this season. The match will be broadcast locally on Bally SoCal and will stream in the US on Paramount+ and internationally at NWSLSoccer.com. English- and Spanish-language radio broadcast swill be available at iHeart and KWKW, respectively.
This will be Angel City's fourth meeting all-time with North Carolina. Last year the two teams split the results, with ACFC winning 2–1 at home and losing 1–0 on the road; in their first meeting this year, in May, they played to a scoreless draw.
North Carolina currently lead the league, with an 8–4–2 record. Their last result was a 1–0 win at home against Houston, their fourth win in a row, on the strength of a 59th-minute goal by forward Tyler Lussi.
Angel City are in 11th place with a 3–6–5 record. Their last league game was a 0–0 draw at NJ/NY Gotham FC last weekend. The team is undefeated in the last four games across all competitions.
Much of North Carolina's success this season comes down to their strong defense. The team is tied with Houston for the best defensive record in the league, with both teams having allowed just 11 goals on the season.
The Courage's defensive dominance isn't about their back line as much as the way the team as a whole plays. Simply put, they don't give their opponents much of the ball. They lead the league in average possession with an impressive 59.7%, with the next-highest possessing team, Gotham, only having 53.7% in that stat. North Carolina also leads in both total passes and passing accuracy.
From an offensive perspective, the Courage are in the middle of the pack. While their 20 goals ties them with Washington for third-most goals in the regular season, their expected goals, or xG, is in ninth place out of the 12 teams at just 17.5; Angel City, meanwhile, has a combined xG of 17.3. Essentially, that indicates that the team has been shooting well, as they've scored more goals than the statistics would predict based on where and how their shots have occurred.
A big part of that discrepancy is thanks to North Carolina's leading scorer, Kerolin, who has been finishing exceptionally well, recording eight goals with an xG of just 5.6.
Like five of her teammates—goalkeeper Casey Murphy, defender Emily Fox, midfielder Denise O'Sullivan, and forwards Rikke Madsen and Mille Gejl—Kerolin departed for the World Cup last week. That means more responsibility for scoring is going to fall on the club's second-best scorer, former Angel City forward Tyler Lussi.
Lussi won't be the only player facing former teammates on Sunday—national team replacement player Elizabeth Eddy, who signed with Angel City last week, played for the Courage from 2017–2019, winning two NWSL Championships and three Supporters Shields during that time.
Merritt Mathias, who has yet to see the field for Angel City due to injury, is a former staple of the Courage defense, having suited up for the team from 2018–2022.