| Tourney Name: | Women's Olympic Football Tournament |
| Year: | 1996 |
| Size: | 150 |
| Country: | United States |
| Dates: | July 21 – August 1 |
| Num Teams: | 8 |
| Confederations: | 4 |
| Venues: | 5 |
| Cities: | 5 |
| Count: | 1 |
| Matches: | 16 |
| Goals: | 53 |
| Nextseason: | 2000 |
The 1996 Summer Olympics—based in Atlanta, Georgia, United States—marked the first time that women participated in the Olympic association football tournament.[1] [2] The tournament featured eight women's national teams from four continental confederations. The teams were drawn into two groups of four and each group played a round-robin tournament (which was held in Miami, Florida, Orlando, Florida, Birmingham, Alabama and Washington, D.C.). At the end of the group stage, the top two teams advanced to the knockout stage (which was held at Sanford Stadium in Athens, Georgia), beginning with the semi-finals and culminating with the gold medal match on August 1, 1996.
The United States became the inaugural champion after a 2–1 victory against China in the gold medal game.[3]
| G | Group stage | ½ | Semifinals | B | 3rd place play-off | F | Final |
| Sun 21 | Mon 22 | Tue 23 | Wed 24 | Thu 25 | Fri 26 | Sat 27 | Sun 28 | Mon 29 | Tue 30 | Wed 31 | Thu 1 | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| G | G | G | ½ | B | F | ||||||||
See main article: Football at the 1996 Summer Olympics – Women's qualification.
The qualification system for the inaugural women's football tournament was based on the results of the 1995 FIFA Women's World Cup. Seven best teams and the host nation were qualified for the tournament. As the third-ranked United States team was already qualified as the host, its spot was passed down to the eighth-ranked team, Japan. England was ranked seventh, but due to it not being an IOC member, its spot was passed down to the ninth-ranked Brazil.[4]
The tournament was held in five stadiums across five cities:
| Athens, Georgia | Birmingham, Alabama | Miami, Florida | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sanford Stadium | Legion Field | Orange Bowl | ||||
| Capacity: 86,100 | Capacity: 81,700 | Capacity: 74,476 | ||||
| Orlando, Florida | Washington, D.C. | |||||
| Citrus Bowl | Robert F. Kennedy Stadium | |||||
| Capacity: 65,000 | Capacity: 56,500 | |||||
See main article: Football at the 1996 Summer Olympics – Women's team squads.
| Confederation | Referee | |
|---|---|---|
| Female officials | ||
| CONCACAF | Sonia Denoncourt (Canada) | |
| CONMEBOL | Cláudia Vasconcelos (Brazil) | |
| UEFA | Ingrid Jonsson (Sweden) | |
| Bente Skogvang (Norway) | ||
| Male officials | ||
| AFC | Omer Al Mehannah (Saudi Arabia) | |
| CAF | Gamal Al-Ghandour (Egypt) | |
| CONCACAF | Benito Archundia (Mexico) | |
| OFC | Eddie Lennie (Australia) | |
| UEFA | Pierluigi Collina (Italy) | |
| José María García-Aranda (Spain) | ||
| Confederation | Referee | |
|---|---|---|
| Male officials | ||
| AFC | Pirom Un-prasert (Thailand) | |
| CONMEBOL | Antônio Pereira (Brazil) | |
| Roberto Ruscio (Argentina) | ||
| Confederation | Assistant referee | |
|---|---|---|
| Female officials | ||
| CONCACAF | Janice Gettemeyer (United States) | |
| María del Socorro Rodríguez (Mexico) | ||
| UEFA | Gitte Holm (Denmark) | |
| Nelly Viennot (France) | ||
| Male officials | ||
| AFC | Jeon Young-hyun (South Korea) | |
| Mohamed Al-Musawi (Oman) | ||
| CAF | Dramane Dante (Mali) | |
| Amir Osman Mohamed Hamid (Sudan) | ||
| CONCACAF | Peter Kelly (Trinidad and Tobago) | |
| CONMEBOL | Jorge Luis Arango (Colombia) | |
| Carlos Velázquez (Uruguay) | ||
| OFC | Lencie Fred (Vanuatu) | |
| UEFA | Yuri Dupanov (Belarus) | |
See main article: Football at the 1996 Summer Olympics – Women's tournament – Group E.
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See main article: Football at the 1996 Summer Olympics – Women's tournament – Group F.
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The United States won the FIFA Fair Play Award, given to the team with the best record of fair play during the tournament.