These Matildas Might Be the Cure

These Matildas Might Be the Cure

GuyWhoLikesSport

When Sam Kerr was declared not fit to play on the night of Australia’s first game at the 2023 Women’s World Cup, I wasn’t upset or despondent.  

 I laughed.  

Australian football has a way of kicking fans in the guts in situations ways that seem unfathomably tragic.

This was just another kick, a tragedy so specific, so crushing, that it could only come from Australian football.

Over my lifetime, Australian football has been the living embodiment of the idiom that “it’s the hope that kills you”.  

 When Kerr was ruled out of a World Cup Australia was hosting, and was favourite in, it was the hope of a victory on home soil that killed me. 

I was instantly reminded of the 2006 Men’s World Cup Round of 16 game against Italy.

You remember the one, in this instance though, I’m not even talking about the tragedy of how Australia lost that game.

I’m talking about what happened before.  

Australia's Odd World Cup Optimism - The New York Times

Trigger Warning. 

I’m not sure I’ve ever felt quite so deflated as I was before that game when Harry Kewell, with no warning at all, grimaced his way to the bench in a white polo on crutches.

Nobody knew he was injured, there was no leak.

Everyone assumed the talismanic presence for Australian football, clearly the most technically gifted player in that team, would be out there for the biggest game in Australian men’s football history up to that point.  

Then he wasn’t.  

The Kerr injury just felt like it fit in the tapestry of melancholy that Australian football has so expertly woven since 1975. 

That’s why I’ve refrained from writing about them for this long. early in the tournament, without Kerr Australia felt toothless.

The game against Ireland was uninspiring, while the game against Nigeria was demoralising.  

It would have been so uniquely Australian football to get bundled out in the group stages of a home tournament where you have one of the better teams on paper.  

I texted a friend during the portion of the Ireland game where they were peppering the Australian goal with no joy (we call that the Leckie) that “the Socceroos would cop one here.”

And they probably would have, or at least required the keeper to make a Gordon Banks-level save

The Tillies didn’t, you had to wonder if they were built of sterner stuff.  

Then against Canada, the reigning gold medallists, with Tony G’s head well and truly sitting on the block, the Matildas played their best game of the tournament.

Putting on one of the best displays of football an Australian national team has ever put on to book their ticket to the Round of 16.  

Then, against Denmark, they topped it. I have had my issues with the almost flat 4 that the Matilda’s have played up front for the tournament, but these last two games it has worked beautifully.  

My issue has lain at the feet of Fowler and Van Egmond, a pairing I would have described ungenerously as “tolerably creative” prior to the Denmark game, but they were exceptional against the Danes.

The wide players, Raso and Foord, have had excellent World Cups but had struggled for service prior to the Canada game. 

Fowler finally got her dribbling game going as she fed the wingers with pinpoint passing across all distances.

She was exceptional and played clearly her best game of the World Cup.

As she grows as a player, I can see why so many view the sky as the limit for her.

Van Egmond, for mine, is more workmanlike than anything but she is a presence in the middle of the park and kept her composure well when she fed the ball to Raso for Australia’s second goal.  

https://twitter.com/7Sport/status/1688520479491907584?s=20

If those two (albeit one will almost definitely make way for Kerr as she gets fitter) continue to play well this team is built to contend.

The defence, protected by Gorry the Destroyer (who has real shades of Vinnie Grella) and Catley, has kept two clean sheets against potent attacking sides.

They have generally looked assured and have barely given up anything gilt-edged. 

Realistically though, Kerr’s injection was the jolt that pushed me to write this column.

It’s hard to get over a calf, especially for an athlete as powerful as Sam Kerr, but when she was injected, she showed a genuine burst of pace, fashioned herself a half-chance, and instantly reasserted herself as the focal point of this team.

The already jubilant crowd also went to another level.  

https://twitter.com/7Sport/status/1688520038800584705?s=20

I watched the game on the plane on the way to England (amazing what technology can do) and I almost started crying when took off the warm-up top and donned the jersey for the first time all tournament.

I’m not sure if planes do something to me (I bawled during Room last time I flew overseas and I don’t love Brie Larsen) or if Sam Kerr means more to the national consciousness than any athlete in Australia today. 

If she is back, and can get fit before Saturday’s quarter final, it will be time to really wonder if this year’s Matilda’s team can be a long-term antidote to the tragedy-laced tapestry of Australian football.  

The post-Asian Cup Socceroos couldn’t do it, but perhaps they shouldn’t have been expected to.

The Matildas occupy a different level to the Socceroos and have to be held to a higher standard.

Maybe they can be the ones to bring us some consistent joy.

This outfit has the capacity to be truly elite, and they are looking like they might truly show it. 

 

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