Australia’s 2-1 defeat to Italy in the Women’s World Cup overnight was exactly what a football association that prioritises anything but football deserves.
There was one team that looked like they knew how to play football last night, and it wasn’t the Matildas.
Not the pretty, precise triangles, 4-3-3 national curriculum type of football that looks good on paper but gets found out the second a useful opponent shows up.
But the niggling, nagging, negative sort of football that infuriates neutrals but inevitably produces results.
And at some point Football Federation Australia needs to ask itself what sort of football nation it wants Australia to be.
Because apparently we can’t be both. Not on the basis of what we saw last night.
Australia’s night started badly when Barbara Bonansea opened the scoring for Italy after nine minutes only for the VAR to harshly rule the goal out for offside, and got progressively worse from there.
We should have known it was coming.
Performances have been scratchy for some time even before the Netherlands dished out a 3-0 friendly defeat in Eindhoven last week.
But when Sam Kerr tucked away the rebound from her meekly-hit penalty, it looked like the gods of football were set to smile on the Matildas.
Why wouldn’t we have assumed that?
Australia’s defence might have looked decidedly shaky inside the first 20 minutes, but suddenly the Matildas were 1-0 up.
But as has so often been the case across a vast array of Australian national teams, what the Matildas failed to do thereafter was play smart tournament football.
And not for the first time, an obsession with playing out from the back has surely cost the Matildas a win on the biggest stage of all.
(Photo by Pier Marco Tacca/Getty Images)
It hardly seems fair to single out one individual when virtually the whole team played poorly, but Clare Polkinghorne won’t want to watch that game back in a hurry.
The decision to play out from defence seemed harmless enough until Polkinghorne miscontrolled Alanna Kennedy’s routine pass.
Even then, the difference in attitude between the two teams was on full display, as Bonansea simply ignored an unmarked Ilaria Mauro in the middle of the park in favour of taking the ball on herself to score.
And the equaliser was no less than the Italians deserved, having chipped away all afternoon at the nervy Aussie defence and been denied by a couple of close offside calls.
The Matildas had their chances too but unlike the clinical Bonansea, the bounce of the ball just never seemed to go their way.
Even into stoppage time it looked like the Matildas might pull a victory out of the fire, only to concede the sort of disastrous winner that is fast becoming an Aussie trademark.
And the question must surely be asked of whether dismissing a coach less than six months out from a World Cup and replacing him with a coach entirely new to the squad was a smart decision.
However, bad optics have become Football Federation Australia’s speciality.
How else do we explain the apparent presence in France of FFA board member Heather Reid, who for legal reasons was forced to give an “unreserved apology” to Stajcic barely a week out from the tournament?
Reid’s trip to the World Cup – presumably at the game’s expense – is an affront to anyone who has ever bought a ticket to a match, paid registration fees or decked themselves out in official merchandise.
Yet when it comes to making the right decision, the FFA gets it wrong every single time.
A stoppage-time defeat to a crafty Italy wouldn’t feel like such a disaster if only it didn’t come on the back of the game shooting itself in the foot every step of the way.
But that’s the kind of football nation Australia is fast becoming.
When it comes to national traits, we’re the Basil Fawlty of the world game.
Punter
Roar Rookie
He is the son of Italian immigrants, who somehow ended up following AFL, only in Melbourne.
sheek
Roar Guru
Nemesis, As with MF below, I bow to your superior soccer house. Cheers.
sheek
Roar Guru
Mister Football, Thanks. I bow to your superior soccer nouse. Cheers.
Mister Football
Roar Guru
Sheek Re Kerr, I agree, I didn't notice watching live, only picked it up on one of the replays which showed her having a good hard look at where she was going (unless she was trying to create doubt by being too obvious). Re the keeper, she had a penchant for parrying the ball back across the open goal mouth, did it on at least three occasions, Australia should have scored again from one such occasion. I disagree with you about how good Italy were, they were ok, better than what they have been in the recent past, but at the end of the day, their game plan was pretty obvious and they relied on a 95th min hail mary to win. The biggest disappointment is that the coaching staff should have seen it coming and tweaked things a bit.
Admiral Ackbar
Guest
Danny De Silva?
Nemesis
Guest
Did you watch the full 90 minutes, or were you watching the cricket & just saw the highlights on Ch9 news? There is lots of valid criticism you can aim at the players, but there is absolutely no evidence to validate the criticism that it was a "wimpish effort" or "they lacked energy & enthusiasm". The Italians hardly had the ball. You'd know this if you watched the game. You'd know this if you checked the stats. The match went for around 100 minutes & the Italians had around 1 completed pass per minute on average. That's not the sign of a team who dominated with energy & enthusiasm. Australia must improve certain aspects of their game. But, running around with energy & enthusiasm is not one of the improvements. What does "wimpish effort" even mean? Did you want them to Coward Punch someone like they do in real Aussie sports?
sheek
Roar Guru
My only comment is that Kerr telegraphed her intentions with her penalty shot, by looking at where she wanted to strike it to. Consequently the Italian keeper moved in the right direction blocking the shot, but unfortunately for her, not securing the ball. Okay, a general comment. I'm not a soccer aficionado, but heck, what a wimpish effort from the Matildas. They lacked energy & enthusiasm, all of which seemed to be with the Italians. Sadly for us, it was only fair that Italy won. They were much the better team.
Punter
Roar Rookie
OK top draw, you are correct. Yes the likes of Crino, Krncevic, Patikas, Markovski, Okon, Zelic, Ivanovic all had a better then average first touch. A couple of them Okon & Zelic even went on to a decent career in Europe, but none of them were champions of Europe level, maybe as the workers of the Liverpool side, whereas Kewell & Duke could've been the stars of the team. As for Ivanovic, I think you will find he didn't set foot into Australia until he was 29 years old.
Nemesis
Guest
You actually said: "top draw" not world class. Never mind. What does 'world class' mean in this context? Liverpool are Club Champions of Europe. How many of their players do you rate as having a first touch that's world class?
Punter
Roar Rookie
I said world class Nem.
Nemesis
Guest
The FFA Curriculum will help, in so far as it provides a set of guidelines & milestones to assist & direct coaches in knowing what they need to teach kids during their football development. No different to a Curriculum for Mathematics, or English, or Art, etc. Doesn't mean every kid will be a success, but it will ensure the kids who are inclined to such fields of endeavour will gain the proper education to ground them for their future. The Curriculum was first published in 2009. Then it would take at least 12 months for the first coaches to become familiar with the document. So, if we are being generous, the Curriculum was first used in 2010 on kids aged 6 years old (born in 2004). This means those kids who have developed under the guidance of the FFA Curriculum are aged 15 right now. That's assuming their coaches were fully accredited in 2010. So, if you're expecting players aged 22-30 to have benefited from the Curriculum you're going to be disappointed.
Will
Guest
That’s the big question and we all thought the FFA curriculum would helped here! Sounds like something is missing still, what it is we all can guess what. Lack of Street football? Better coaching? Better football culture? Who knows.
Will
Guest
That’s the thing with the girls is they have the physical power and the mentality to do well at this level but maybe the coach should adjust according to their realistic skill set? Put it this way we don’t have the same tech ability and intelligence like say Spain or Japan and given the quality we have it’s better suited to reflect a style with what we got.
Johnny J-Dog
Guest
Maybe the Matildas simply aren't that good no matter who coaches them.
Johnny J-Dog
Guest
Well now there's two of you. Gorry came on and nothing changed. Her pass success rate is woeful, she will never win in the air, she can't shoot with any power and she has no pace. Pretty much the same problems as Joe Caletti at Brisbane Roar.
Nemesis
Guest
Good to see I'm not the only one who understands the football mastery of Katrina Gorry. Katrina Gorry is the answer to Australia's World Cup problems https://www.espn.com.au/football/club/australia/2751/blog/post/3872974/katrina-gorry-is-the-answer-to-australias-world-cup-problems
Nemesis
Guest
Off the top of my head, I'd add: Crino, Krncevic, Patikas, Markovski, Okon, Zelic, Ivanovic. I was too young to assess the technical ability of the Class of 74, but I've heard great things about Ray Baartz, in particular.
RF
Roar Rookie
I would add Bresciano to that list, but agree on that 3 and only that 3.
RF
Roar Rookie
Could it be more obvious?
RF
Roar Rookie
Demonstrably so. Are you? Beyond being gratuitously offensive, that is?