'We had a dream' bronze for history-making U-17 footballers

1:24 pm on 2 December 2018

The U-17 New Zealand women's footballers have made more history, beating Canada 2-1 to come third at the FIFA U-17 Women's World Cup in Uruguay.

New Zealand's Grace Wisnewski (2-R) celebrates with teammates after scoring against Canada in the U-17 Women's World Cup football match for the third place in Montevideo. Photo: AFP

Grace Wisnewski of Hamilton Wanderers scored both goals at the stadium in Montevideo.

Wisnewski's first goal came after just 15 seconds, the quickest goal in FIFA under-17 World Cup finals history.

She added a second after 13 minutes.

Wisnewski also hit the goal post in the second half.

Canada scored after 65 minutes and dominated the rest of the game, but the New Zealanders were able to hold them out to take the victory.

See how the game unfolded

Canada had 62 percent of the possession and had 22 shots at goal compared to New Zealand's nine.

Coach Leon Birnie was very proud of his side.

"Who would have thought, we came over here, we had a dream we got out of the group, created history for the first time ...then got into the semi-finals, created more history and now we've just got a bronze medal at a World Cup, like how good are these players."

"It was a great performance, I thought first half we were really good, second half it was just pure determination and drive to hang in there and get that medal."

The team became the first from New Zealand to advance past the first knockout stage at a FIFA tournament.

In five previous appearances at the under 17 tournament New Zealand had never finished higher than 12th.

A group of Hamilton Wanderers football players and supporters gathered at their clubrooms this morning to cheer on local hero Grace Wisnewski.

Wisnewski's coach at Wanderers, Steve Cox, was one of those in front of the TV this morning and he said it made their day.

"We've got a home game today so everyone came down to the club beforehand just to watch the girls and cheer them on and yeah it was great to see Wisnewski get a couple of goals and see the girls work really hard in the second half and just cheering them on and really pleased for them, they deserved what they got," said Cox.

Spain beat Mexico 2-1 in the final.