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The FIFA Women’s World Cup has been thrilling us all through the group stages, and now that we have a day to reflect and to plan our Round of 16 movements, the stark realisation has hit that we have neglected all the other football in our lives.
In two weeks, the best tournament ever will be over and we will be looking around in panic to see where we get our next football fix, before remembering that we’ve missed a whole host of action that would normally be the No.1 priority through the winter months.
Locally, the National Premier League competitions continue and are in fact reaching the home straight.
The honeymoon period, where women’s games were rearranged so players could go and watch their sporting heroes in the World Cup, has been suddenly shattered, in NSW at least, and the midday Netherlands-South Africa blockbuster at the Sydney Football Stadium on Sunday clashes with every NPL youth women’s game.
Once FIFA has left the country, we’ll be back on the sidelines cheering on the next generation of football stars, and perhaps we’ll be joined by one or two more fans as a direct result of the hype from our biggest football tournament ever. But this weekend we make that unwanted choice.
The A-Leagues are in pre-season, but the national knockout cup competition, the Australia Cup, is taking full advantage of a unique situation, and is scheduled in for the rest days of the World Cup, the round of 32 kicking off on Friday night. Peninsula Power versus Wellington Phoenix, anyone?
Internationally, the major European teams have been in friendly action, West Ham and Tottenham having played in Perth in July, and a host of EPL teams have played in the USA and around the world.
Arsenal beat Barcelona, Bayern Munich won 27-0 and Inter Milan beat PSG in Tokyo. This has all flown under the radar as our heads have been turned by what’s on show in our own country.
This weekend sees the start of the Scottish Premier League, the FA Community Shield sees Arsenal and Manchester City meet at Wembley and the English Football League is back up and running.
Next weekend, as the Women’s World Cup reaches the quarter-finals stage, the English Premier League and other European leagues return, and we’ll have to make choices about what we watch.
Heung-Min Son (Photo by Joe Prior/Visionhaus via Getty Images)
Soon we’ll have the Socceroos returning to action with a game against Mexico in Dallas, the Champions League draw will unfold, and we will return to the crazy normal that us football fans in Australia know and love.
But how good is it to have been wooed by the FIFA Women’s World Cup? The best women’s players, the best teams from every continent, all coming together in our country with the eyes of the world firmly fixed on packed venues that we often only see at quarter capacity or less.
Even if it is two teams from elsewhere in the world who play out the World Cup final, the football landscape in Australia is changed forever, and even if Gianni Infantino says that football will be the biggest sport in Australia, those inside football already know that it is.
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