[1] Originally, China was to host the 2003 edition, but the outbreak of SARS in that country forced that event to be moved to the United States.

FIFA immediately granted the 2007 event to China, which meant that no new host nation was chosen competitively until the voting was held for the 2011 Women's World Cup.

[7] From there they travelled to the various venues for their designated games, before returning to base camp to continue with their specialised training programmes.

[7] As well as fitness training, they attended regular theory sessions and reviewed previous matches to try to identify possible errors and improve their performance levels.

The group draw took place on 22 April 2007 at the Guanggu Science and Technology Exhibition Centre in Wuhan after the completion of the qualifying rounds.

The same four teams were drawn together in Group A in the 2003 FIFA Women's World Cup,[16] on that occasion the US and Sweden progressed to the knockout stages.

[27][28][29] Nadine Angerer Bente Nordby Ariane Hingst Li Jie Ane Stangeland Horpestad Kerstin Stegemann Daniela Formiga Kelly Smith Renate Lingor Ingvild Stensland Kristine Lilly Lisa De Vanna Marta Cristiane Birgit Prinz There were 111 goals scored in 32 matches, for an average of 3.47 goals per match.

Originally it was thought that, should England make the top three European teams, they would compete under the United Kingdom banner.

Kenneth Heiner-Møller and Danish players accused the Chinese hosts of harassment and covert surveillance prior to China's first round match against Denmark.

China's Swedish coach Marika Domanski-Lyfors and her assistant Pia Sundhage were unaware of the incidents and Heiner-Møller absolved them of any blame, although he refused to shake hands after the match.