Carli Lloyd had just scored on an 18-yard volley to put the United States ahead 11 minutes into its Women's World Cup match Sunday against Chile. After leaping, pumping a fist and hugging teammate Lindsey Horan, she raised both hands chin high and made four tiny pitter-patter claps, the type seen more frequently at Pebble Beach than Parc des Princes.

A message? You bet.

Easy wins and lots of goals are par for the course when it comes to the U.S. women's national team.

"I can't take credit for it. I'm not sure if Lindsey is taking credit for it," Lloyd said after a 3-0 victory in Paris clinched the U.S. a spot in the round of 16. "She had told me if we score, that's what we're going to do, so I just went along with it after I did my little celebration. But it was fun. I think it made a statement on the sideline there. It was cool."

A record-setting 13-0 rout of Thailand that opened the tournament for the Americans sparked a debate back home. Celebration had not been discussed this much since Kool & the Gang. Some cried poor sportsmanship. Others argued players shouldn't be asked to let up on soccer's biggest stage.

All the harrumphing was heard across the Atlantic.

"I guess we could have just passed it around the back for a million times, but that's boring. That's disrespectful to everyone: fans, ourselves," veteran Megan Rapinoe said. "The only thing you ask of an athlete really is to put it all out there and do the best you can. It's not in our DNA ever."

• Women's World Cup 2019: Schedule, results, how to watch

• Carli Lloyd's record day lifts USWNT over Chile

• Unconventional blueprint paved way for U.S. star Lindsey Horan

Horan said Emily Sonnett, a 25-year-old defender at her first World Cup, suggested responses. Trolling critics was the goal.

"We decided to do something different today," Horan said with an impish smile. "Handshakes were part of it. Golf clap was part of it."

Coach Jill Ellis speculated Lloyd's inspiration was Lloyd's spouse, professional golfer Brian Hollins.

"I'm guessing it was a shout-out to her husband," Ellis said.

The 13 goals against Thailand did pay off in the end, after Sweden also won Sunday; they give the U.S. a superior goal difference, allowing the Americans to win Group F should Thursday's final group-stage game against the Swedes end in a draw.

But winning the group likely would put the U.S. on track for a quarterfinal matchup against host France in Paris. Ellis would not speculate whether her team would be better off finishing second and winding up in the other half of the bracket.

"There's a lot of grass to navigate between now and potential matchups," she said. "This game is a crazy game, and you have to bring it every single match."

No team has won consecutive Women's World Cups since the event began in 1991, a reason for sangfroid.

"We're climbing up a mountain now," Lloyd said, "and it's only going to get harder."

Uruguay crushed Ecuador 4-0 in their Copa America opener on Sunday with help from an early sending off that deflated their opponents and assured the 15-times champions the simplest of starts to their campaign.

Uruguay were already leading 1-0 from a sixth minute Nicolas Lodeiro goal when Jose Quintero was shown a VAR-assisted red card for throwing an arm in an aerial challenge.

The 23rd minute sending off put Uruguay firmly in the driving seat and Edinson Cavani with an acrobatic volley and Luis Suarez with a poacher's goal made it 3-0 by half-time.

The Uruguayans took their foot off the pedal in an uneventful second half but an own goal from Arturo Mina 12 minutes from time, confirmed by VAR, sealed a miserable night for Ecuador.

"We had our chances in the first half and we took them. That allowed us to manage the game," Cavani said. "They went down to 10 men and that allowed us to control the match."

The result, Uruguay's biggest win in the Copa America since 1967, puts them top of Group C, with Japan to play Chile in the second group game tomorrow.

Ecuador, one of only two South American sides never to win the tournament, looked poor throughout the game at the Mineirao stadium and will have to recover quickly before facing Chile, the current Copa America champions in Salvador on Friday.

Uruguay's next match is against Japan in Porto Alegre on Thursday. (All matches live in the U.S. on ESPN+).

Sometimes things take a 180-degree turn. Up becomes down. White is now black. Thor turns out to be Loki. Your certainties end up being replaced by what you thought was heresy.

Welcome to the Maurizio Sarri managerial experience at Chelsea, which officially came to an end on Sunday. It's hard to tell what would have seemed more absurd this time a year ago: that Sarri would leave Chelsea to join Juventus, or that his biggest shortcoming at Stamford Bridge would be playing a style of football that pundits and fans did not enjoy.

The conventional wisdom when he was appointed was pretty clear. Sarri would implement his style of football, based on short passing, coordinated movement and a high press, and it would be fabulously entertaining if potentially a bit naive. If he failed, it would be solely down to results, because more pragmatic and cynical opponents regularly smashed and grabbed their way to the points. As for the idea of him leaving for Juventus after just one season, the idea that Sarri truly would be on his way felt only slightly less plausible than that of Cristiano Ronaldo becoming a Franciscan monk.

Instead, what do we have? Sarri is confirmed as the next Juve manager. Chelsea finished third, behind two teams that finished with two of the three highest points totals in Premier League history. They also won the Europa League final and reached the League Cup final, where they were beaten only on penalties. Any way you slice it, Sarri ticked the results box.

And yet, folks didn't like his football. Or, perhaps more accurately, they liked it at first when it was accompanied by results -- Chelsea lost their first game in all competitions in late November, winning 15 of 17 in all competitions along the way -- and then turned on it when they hit a road bump. That's when the floodgates of criticism opened. That's when some supporters and ex-pros-turned-pundits started moaning about "like for like" substitutions (the Ross Barkley-for-Mateo Kovacic move, and vice versa, was a classic) and saying stuff like, Gee, wouldn't Chelsea be so much better if Jorginho and N'Golo Kanteswitched positions. (The latter was often said with a straight face.)

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Sarri never recovered. He became a caricature, some sort of googly-eyed dogmatist whose explanations were laughed off by the braying masses. Such as when he said his system is predicated on a deep-lying playmaker: It doesn't necessarily need to be Jorginho, but it can't be Kante, because Kante doesn't have the skill set to play there. Many understood that it would be akin to asking Adele to front a metal band. To others, it was a simple equation: "Look! He really has lost it! He thinks Kante is better than Jorginho -- what a fool!"

At the boardroom level, Chelsea were miffed. They had appointed Sarri because they believed that European football had changed, that you needed to play proactive, attacking and possession-based football. That's what every top club played, with the possible exception of Jose Mourinho at Manchester United, Max Allegri at Juventus and Diego Simeone at Atletico Madrid. (Not coincidentally, two of those three have since moved on.)

They also felt that having a "system" manager would also be more cost efficient relative to his predecessors, Mourinho and Antonio Conte. After all, at Napoli, Sarri had played a key role in the development of players such as Lorenzo Insigne, Kalidou Koulibaly, Allan and Dries Mertens. Given the assembly line of talent churned out by Chelsea's academy -- from Callum Hudson-Odoi to Ethan Ampadu, Ruben Loftus-Cheek to Reece James, Andreas Christensen to Fikayo Tomori, Mason Mount to Tammy Abraham -- they reckoned he'd be the sort of guy to help develop it over time.

Instead, his football -- especially when the winter set in -- left many cold, and this is perhaps where, in the modern game, it's worth remembering another key element to management: In addition to delivering results, developing the team and keeping the bosses happy, you need to connect with the fans. Or, more accurately, if you connect with the fans, the job gets a whole heck of a lot easier.

Ultimately, the fans are your customers, the folks who pay your salary. You represent the brand they love. If you're a match, or they see you as a match, the road ahead is downhill. Just ask Jurgen Klopp. Or Pep Guardiola. Or Mauricio Pochettino. Or, because there is more than one way to connect, Simeone.

Sarri never achieved that connection with enough of the fan base, meaning the portion of the supporters who go to Stamford Bridge and scream the loudest when things go wrong. One school of thought is that Chelsea fans connect best with a certain type of pragmatic, bellicose manager who plays to the crowd and Sarri isn't that (unlike Conte and Mourinho). It's no coincidence the one Chelsea boss before Sarri who tried to bring about a philosophical shift to proactive attacking football, Andre Villas-Boas, also failed to connect with the fan base and, at times, felt like a foreign object.

Culture matters, and while it can change and evolve over time, it's not an easy process.

Chelsea were willing to go down that road with Sarri. Had Juventus not come calling, Sarri would have been back next season. The transfer ban that would have made it difficult to attract a top manager, the departure of Eden Hazard and the nearly $50 million already shelled out in compensation to sacked managers over the past four years no doubt would have played a part in that decision, of course. But the belief that the club's style needs updating remains.

In Sarri's case, it wasn't the message and it wasn't even the messenger, though a different one may have fared better. It was simply circumstance and the way it was received. Perhaps also the realisation that shaking 15 years of history and expectation will take more than a season.

The curious thing is that Sarri's next chapter takes him to a club trying to execute a similar philosophical and cultural U-turn after eight seasons of dominance in Serie A under Allegri and Conte. You can only hope that some lessons were learned from Sarri's season at Stamford Bridge. By Sarri and by Chelsea, sure, but also by Juventus.

Triple Olympic gold medal-winning rower Drew Ginn and longtime Justin Langer collaborator Ben Oliver have been formally commissioned as the new high performance executives for Cricket Australia, taking joint control of an area that sprawled into such vast territory under the former czar Pat Howard that the governing body deemed it too large for one person to run.

Howard was sacked by the new chief executive Kevin Roberts shortly after he replaced James Sutherland, in the wake of the damning Ethics Centre review of Australian cricket culture that was ordered after the Newlands ball tampering scandal last year. A lengthy search for Howard's replacement has seen the role filled temporarily by the executive in charge of community cricket, Belinda Clark, as CA stopped and then redefined the recruiting process as being for two jobs rather than one. Ginn will be based in Melbourne and Olivier in Brisbane with the pair starting on July 29.

While Howard joined cricket "cold" in 2011, following a career in rugby union, pharmacy and property development, Ginn has moved across from his background in rowing and the Olympic movement via two years as the head of high performance with Tasmania. He will take control of a role primarily responsible for the running of domestic competitions, Australian youth teams, player, coach and umpire pathways including club cricket, talent ID and sports science.

"I am looking forward to joining Cricket Australia and having the opportunity to work more broadly across the National system," Ginn said. "The past two years with Cricket Tasmania have been immensely rewarding.

"This is a chance to continue the work I have enjoyed locally and to now work closely with many great people involved in leading our domestic, national and youth competitions along with the leaders of our State programs, and those leaders in our Cricket Australia pathway programs, and our sports science and sports medicine areas."

Peter Roach, the head of cricket operations, will report to Ginn. Roach has also taken over control of scheduling, an area of some difficulty for CA in recent times after India insisted on an ODI tour in mid-January next year. The Big Bash League, Sheffield Shield and domestic one-day tournament programs for next summer are still to be announced.

Oliver, a former first-class player for Victoria and Tasmania, held roles with CA, Cricket Victoria and the ICC before working closely with Langer as the high performance manager for Western Australia since 2012. Together, they established a program that was the envy of other states, notably by their use of a squad closely unified between the WA state team and the Perth Scorchers BBL club - a model subsequently used unashamedly by Tasmania and the Hobart Hurricanes.

"I have devoted most of my adult life to cricket, in both playing and high-performance roles, and I am extremely proud and humbled to continue that association as EGM, National Teams," Oliver said. "I look forward to working with Justin Langer and Matthew Mott and their national men's and women's teams, as well as national selectors and all those involved in team operations and logistics."

Among the first items on Oliver's to-do list will be a look at the national selection panel, which will be shorn of the national talent manager Greg Chappell, currently with the Australian team on World Cup assignment, when he retires at the end of the Ashes series. Having already lost Mark Waugh, who was not replaced last year, that would leave only Langer and the chairman of selectors, Trevor Hohns, as formal members of the panel.

Howard's tenure featured no end of issues, as he sought to work as a change agent to pursue goals outlined in the 2011 Don Argus-led review of Australian team performance, which followed the hefty loss of the Ashes 3-1 at home to England in 2010-11. His hard-nosed and confrontational style did not always go down well across the Australian system, particularly when added to his lack of a cricket background.

Alongside numerous issues of workload management for fast bowlers in particular, Howard's term saw the 2013 homework scandal in India that contributed to the sacking of Mickey Arthur to be replaced by Darren Lehmann in 2013, the death of Phillip Hughes in 2014 and subsequent work to change concussion protocols in the game, winning the World Cup in 2015 on home soil and then suffering a dramatic Ashes defeat in England later that same year.

Another run of losses in late 2016, including Test series defeats by Sri Lanka away and South Africa at home, led to Rod Marsh's resignation as selection chairman and a refocus on the demands for strong performance by the Australian team - Howard and Sutherland visited the team dressing room in Hobart to push that message directly. Results did improve, including a narrow series defeat against a highly fancied India in India in 2017, and the regaining of the Ashes at home in 2017-18, before the Newlands scandal in South Africa led to many changes, including the end of Howard's time in the job.

Clark was left to run the department while a replacement could be found, and it was her opinion that the executive general manager's role had to be split in two. "Australian cricket owes Belinda a debt of gratitude for the exceptional job she has performed throughout a challenging time for Australian cricket," Roberts said. "She is one of our game's greatest trailblazers and servants at all levels and we are delighted that she will resume her role as EGM of Community Cricket in late August after handing over to Ben and Drew and having a well-earned break. It is a critical role and a job she loves."

Carli Lloyd had just scored on an 18-yard volley to put the United States ahead 11 minutes into its Women's World Cup match Sunday against Chile. After leaping, pumping a fist and hugging teammate Lindsey Horan, she raised both hands chin high and made four tiny pitter-patter claps, the type seen more frequently at Pebble Beach than Parc des Princes.

A message? You bet.

Easy wins and lots of goals are par for the course when it comes to the U.S. women's national team.

"I can't take credit for it. I'm not sure if Lindsey is taking credit for it," Lloyd said after a 3-0 victory in Paris clinched the U.S. a spot in the round of 16. "She had told me if we score, that's what we're going to do, so I just went along with it after I did my little celebration. But it was fun. I think it made a statement on the sideline there. It was cool."

A record-setting 13-0 rout of Thailand that opened the tournament for the Americans sparked a debate back home. Celebration had not been discussed this much since Kool & the Gang. Some cried poor sportsmanship. Others argued players shouldn't be asked to let up on soccer's biggest stage.

All the harrumphing was heard across the Atlantic.

"I guess we could have just passed it around the back for a million times, but that's boring. That's disrespectful to everyone: fans, ourselves," veteran Megan Rapinoe said. "The only thing you ask of an athlete really is to put it all out there and do the best you can. It's not in our DNA ever."

• Women's World Cup 2019: Schedule, results, how to watch

• Carli Lloyd's record day lifts USWNT over Chile

• Unconventional blueprint paved way for U.S. star Lindsey Horan

Horan said Emily Sonnett, a 25-year-old defender at her first World Cup, suggested responses. Trolling critics was the goal.

"We decided to do something different today," Horan said with an impish smile. "Handshakes were part of it. Golf clap was part of it."

Coach Jill Ellis speculated Lloyd's inspiration was Lloyd's spouse, professional golfer Brian Hollins.

"I'm guessing it was a shout-out to her husband," Ellis said.

The 13 goals against Thailand did pay off in the end, after Sweden also won Sunday; they give the U.S. a superior goal difference, allowing the Americans to win Group F should Thursday's final group-stage game against the Swedes end in a draw.

But winning the group likely would put the U.S. on track for a quarterfinal matchup against host France in Paris. Ellis would not speculate whether her team would be better off finishing second and winding up in the other half of the bracket.

"There's a lot of grass to navigate between now and potential matchups," she said. "This game is a crazy game, and you have to bring it every single match."

No team has won consecutive Women's World Cups since the event began in 1991, a reason for sangfroid.

"We're climbing up a mountain now," Lloyd said, "and it's only going to get harder."

PEBBLE BEACH, Calif. -- Gary Woodland denied Brooks Koepka's bold bid at history and made U.S. Open memories of his own Sunday with two clutch shots, a birdie putt on the final hole and that silver trophy in his hands at Pebble Beach.

Yeah, he's got this.

Koepka, trying to match a 114-year-old record with his third straight U.S. Open, kept the pressure on until the very end. Woodland was just as unflappable and got better with each big moment he faced, whether it was a 3-wood from 263 yards or a lob wedge from the putting surface that will take its place with other big moments on the 17th hole of Pebble Beach.

Needing three putts to win, Woodland finished in style with a 30-foot birdie putt for a 2-under 69, giving him the lowest 72-hole score in six U.S. Opens at Pebble Beach and a three-shot victory over Koepka. He raised both arms in the air to salute the crowd, turned toward the Pacific and slammed down his fist.

"I never let myself get ahead," Woodland said. "Once that went in, it all came out of me. It's special to finish it off here at Pebble Beach."

Koepka had to settle for a footnote in history. He closed with a 68, making him the first player with all four rounds in the 60s at a U.S. Open without winning.

But he made Woodland earn every bit of his first major championship.

Clinging to a one-shot lead with more pressure than he has ever felt, Woodland seized control by going for the green on the par-5 14th hole with a 3-wood from 263 yards, narrowly clearing a cavernous bunker and setting up a simple up-and-down for a two-shot lead.

"The idea was to play for the win," Woodland said. "I could have laid up. That 3-wood separated me a little bit."

It was the shot of the tournament, until Woodland hit one even better.

He dropped the 5-iron from his hands when it sailed well to the right on the par-3 17th, the edge of the green with the pin 90 feet away over a hump. Up ahead on the par-5 18th, Koepka drilled a 3-iron just over the back of the green, leaving him a 50-foot chip for eagle to tie, with a birdie likely to do the trick considering what Woodland faced on the 17th.

Koepka chipped to 10 feet and narrowly missed the birdie putt. Woodland, unable to hit putter and get anywhere near the hole, opted to pitch it. He clipped it perfectly just over the hump, and it checked about 12 feet from the hole and trickled out to tap-in range.

"I was just trying to get it over that hump," Woodland said. "I thought it had a chance to go in, but it's not one I want over."

That effectively ended the U.S. Open.

Woodland, a 35-year-old who played basketball for one year at Washburn before taking a golf scholarship at Kansas, is immensely popular with his peers, many of whom gathered behind the 18th to celebrate his first major with him.

His biggest moment of the year wasn't any shot he hit. He starred in a viral video with Amy Bockerstette, a 20-year-old with Down Syndrome, during the Phoenix Open. Woodland invited her to play the par-3 16th, and Amy hit into a bunker, blasted onto the green and made the par putt, all the while saying, "You got this." That was the message she sent Woodland on Saturday night.

Woodland played conservatively down the 18th and made one last birdie that only mattered in the record book. He was aware that Tiger Woods had a 12-under 272 during his historic rout at Pebble Beach in 2000, and he topped him.

That birdie put him at 13-under 271 and earned him $2.25 million, the richest payoff in golf.

The difference was Woods won by 15 shots and was the only player under par. With a marine layer blocking the sunshine, and no significant wind at Pebble Beach all week, 31 players finished under par.

Koepka started four shots behind in his bid to join Willie Anderson as the only players to go back-to-back-to-back in the toughest test in golf. He made up ground quickly with four birdies in five holes.

"I felt like, `We've got a ball game now,"' Koepka said.

He failed to get up-and-down from a bunker for birdie on the par-5 sixth, and missed a 6-foot birdie putt on the par-3 seventh. Still, he stayed within range, just like he wanted, knowing that anything could happen on the back nine of a U.S. Open.

Something wonderful happened to Woodland.

"Gary played a hell of a round today," Koepka said. "Props to him to hang in there. To go out in style like that is pretty cool."

Of the four other players who had a shot at three straight U.S. Opens, no one came closer than Koepka. He now has a victory in the PGA Championship and runner-up finishes in the Masters and U.S. Open.

Justin Rose was the only one who caught Woodland all day, with a birdie on the opening hole. Rose bogeyed from the bunker on No. 2 as Woodland birdied, and he never caught up. Rose fell out of the race with three bogeys in a four-hole stretch on the back nine. He shot 74 and shared third with Xander Schauffele (67), Jon Rahm (68) and Chez Reavie (71).

Woods birdied six of his last 12 holes and was never a factor. He tied for 21st, 11 shots behind.