Opinion: Who with an interest in the Matildas and the World Cup (and, for that matter, the Ashes) has been able to sleep this past week? Not the players. Not their families. Not the fans.
Certainly not soccer authorities dwelling on a free kick for their code in this country and the nightmare possibility of scuffing it.Credit:Not before the tournament: too much excitement. Not during it: what if you miss something? Not before this match: too much dread.Not now that this prospective bum-clencher is done: too much adrenaline still surging through the national veins, too much euphoria, too much relief. Try to put all those to bed anytime soon.
But wishing and hoping isn’t having; any number of Australian teams down the years could tell you that. Perhaps the most memorable occasion for women’s sport in this country this century was the 2019 World Cup cricket final and Australia’s triumph and the 85,000 crowd at the MCG .Lost in the mists now is that the Australians had only just scraped through a rain-blighted semi-final in Sydney three days previously. Without them, the final would have been a very different event.
The Matildas and their minders seemed to resent the focus on what had gone wrong, or worse, what still might. They should have welcomed it, pressure notwithstanding, as the backhand compliment it is.
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