REIMS, France -- Team U.S.A. begins Round of 16 play against Spain Monday afternoon.
Spain and the U.S. team have never met up during a women's World Cup match, and they rarely play against each other in other national tournaments.
And you can bet the Spanish team will come out firing on all cylinders. The team has never appeared in the knockout stage of a women's World Cup before.
The U.S. team is coming off a dominating performance in group stage play, outscoring opponents 18-0 in three games.
One of the big concerns many U.S. fans had is will co-captain Alex Morgan be ready to play? The superstar was taken out of the last match after halftime. "Alex is fine. She’s fine. Yeah, and I think part of it is when you approach the tournament, you have to look, if you can get six points in your first game, kind of beyond that. And so I think trying to be measured in that is important. Sometimes you don’t have that luxury, because you pick up an injury or something and you’re forced to make changes," says coach Jill Ellis.
Coach Ellis also said she will carefully monitor players and make sure they stay hydrated.
The game begins at noon Sunday and airs live on FS1.
