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The Matildas: A team all of Australia can get behind

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30th May, 2019
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There’s a World Cup featuring one of our most popular national teams in action over the next few weeks, and another one hosting the Australian cricket team.

It’s about to get very real for the Matildas.

I had a quick look online overnight for tickets to Sunday morning’s friendly against the Netherlands in Eindhoven and fewer than a thousand remained.

So they’ll run out to a full house against the Dutch in the sort of pre-World Cup friendly that was once the exclusive domain of the Socceroos.

And they’ll no doubt have their tournament opener against Italy at the Stade du Hainaut in Valenciennes in the back of their collective minds when they do.

I don’t know whether Australia’s women’s national team can win the World Cup.

I can’t claim to be any kind of expert when it comes to women’s football.

But I think that’s okay.

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I’m sure it makes me no different to the vast number of Socceroos fans who tune in to watch the national team go around without necessarily knowing every intimate detail about the team.

Sam Kerr backflip new Matildas kit

Sam Kerr celebrates in the new Matildas kit. (Image: Supplied, Nike)

Truth be told, I’m looking forward to simply watching the Matildas as a fan – even though I know I’ll invariably be riding every tackle the second their World Cup campaign kicks off.

The thought that an Australian football team is capable of mixing it with the world’s best makes me happy. I couldn’t care less about their gender.

But it probably does help that women’s football isn’t littered with many of the histrionics that blight the men’s game.

The diving, the time wasting, the egos and incessant machismo are all reserved for men’s football.

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And much as every Aussie sports fan no doubt hopes the Matildas go deep into the tournament in France, the fact that they’ll also play with a bit of integrity is equally important.

That’s a lesson the Australian men’s cricket team learned in the most humiliating way imaginable.

And Steve Smith, David Warner and the gone and now presumably forgotten Cameron Bancroft didn’t just embarrass themselves when they were caught tampering with the ball on Australia’s ill-fated tour of South Africa in 2018.

They embarrassed us.

Smith and Warner’s demeanour after the Aussie team was caught red-handed rubbing sandpaper on the ball in the third Test in Cape Town said everything about a team culture that valued winning at all costs.

There was a breathtaking naivety to their actions on the field and subsequent understanding of the situation off it.

Former Test skipper Smith, star batsman Warner and the discarded Bancroft were raked over the coals for their role in the ball-tampering fiasco, but it took a while for the spotlight to spin around and shine on Cricket Australia.

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It seemed many of the executives who drew a salary from the game didn’t feel particularly responsible for setting the standards of the players who played it.

Maybe they just hoped the whole thing would go away and that everyone would forget about it in time.

A bit like Alen Stajcic, right Football Federation Australia?

Alen Stajcic

Alen Stajcic (Photo by Tony Feder/Getty Images)

In the absence of any publicly listed evidence as to why Stajcic is no longer coaching the Matildas, it’s hard not to believe that at least one Aussie will be tuning in to the Women’s World Cup with mixed emotions.

But that episode – no doubt to the FFA’s relief – is all in the past now.

Italy, perennial heavyweights Brazil and Jamaica await and while we’d all like to believe the Matildas are a chance of winning the tournament, the reality is they’ve got a tough group to get out of first.

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Whatever happens in Eindhoven on Sunday and in France over the next two-and-a-half weeks, the Matildas will no doubt do us proud.

They’re a team the whole nation can get behind.

And maybe, just maybe, even inspire every one of us to dream of actually winning a football World Cup.

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