GLORIOUS SWANSON

Mallory hits winner as Emma Hayes' Team USA win gold medal

- MIKE WALTERS

WOMEN'S FOOTBALL FINAL

Brazil 0 United States 1

EMMA HAYES landed another Olympic gold for Britain at the Parc des Princes – and wrapped it in Stars and Stripes.

Just 85 days after taking charge of the USA women's national team and 11 weeks after her first training session with them - Hayes restored them to the top of the podium for the first time since 2012.

If the sceptics across the Pond feared she had been handed a mission impossible, Hollywood legend Tom Cruise was in the crowd to prove that it wasn't.

Gathering her squad in the centre circle after Mallory Swanson's winner on 57 minutes, Hayes led a communal knees-up to crown the best summer of her life.

Make no mistake, this was a triumph made in Britain.

Hayes, clenching her fists and bellowing skywards on the final whistle, may be a north Londoner by birth - but she's an all-American hero now.