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In 2007 the Matildas slipped out of Australia bound for the World Cup with little fanfare. Four years later, and Tom Sermanni’s side jetted off to Germany on Tuesday night for the latest edition of the global tournament following a heavily attended farewell function the night before and a high profile appearance on a commercial TV breakfast program the next day.
In other words, they left in circumstances that were the exact opposite to those of 2007.
It may have been a long time coming, but our Matildas were more than deserving of such significant attention.
However in Melbourne the departure for a World Cup of a national team, captained by a Victorian no less, made very little impact in the local media.
I suppose for a city that, led by local talk station behemoth 3AW, rounded on the game last week following an underwhelming seven evictions during the Socceroos and Serbia international at Etihad Stadium, this isn’t surprising.
However the question remains does the Melbourne media not care or are Football Federation Australia not trying hard enough?
I’d argue it’s the latter.
While 3AW shock jock Neil Mitchell garnered headlines with his claim “2,000-3,000” Serbian fans behaved like “trash”, many other outlets simply didn’t buy into the story.
In the end Melbourne’s size, and the public’s commitment to football, is deserving of more attention from the game’s peak body.
With Sydney having been the historical centre of the game and FFA currently based there as well, the risk is that one city will command too much focus.
This is something Ben Buckley and FFA’s media department must work to combat.
It would have been nice to see one of the Matildas’ pre-tournament camps or a significant media opportunity take place in Melbourne over the last couple months. Instead there was precious little in Australia’s second largest city while Gosford hosted two international friendlies and Sydney was the location for a media function with the full squad.
The truth is that very few newsrooms have the time or resources to chase such stories and, quite simply, if you want any kind of significant coverage you need to spoon-feed outlets through press events.
It might seem like a minor gripe but the consequences are obvious when you see the media in a major market failing to take any notice of such a positive story.
FFA could do worse then follow the direction of Football Fans Down Under which is currently organizing a football Guinness World Record event in Melbourne for later this year and also hopes to bring their annual awards night to the Victorian capital in the future.
The fact is this tale is not isolated to Melbourne either and can be repeated ad nauseum around the country. In other words, FFA needs to be ensuring it gets national coverage for national stories.
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