If enduring the most disrupted Olympic qualification campaign were itself an Olympic sport, the Matildas, you’d think, would be in contention for a podium finish.
What should have been a straight-forward series of games against Taiwan, Thailand and China in early February became an exercise in logistical improvisation and sports diplomacy as the coronavirus forced Australia’s Group B qualifiers to be moved from city to city, then from country to country.
The Australian government’s hasty implementation of a mandatory quarantine period for the Chinese national team meant yet another delay to the calendar, pushing some matches outside the international window altogether. Then the rain came, followed by concern that the quickly-selected Campbelltown Stadium may not hold up after a biblical amount of rainfall combined with double-header games tearing into its surface.
Yet despite all that, the Matildas came out the other side – bruised, certainly, from that nail-biting 1-1 draw with China – but relatively unscathed. They then eased through the first play-off leg against Vietnam last week, slotting five past a second-tier Asian opponent that hadn’t scored against them in their entire playing history. Indeed, the world No 32 didn’t even register a shot on target in Newcastle (though there were some hairy half-moments).
Then the Matildas arrived in Vietnam for the return leg. Perhaps they thought it would be smooth-sailing, coming in with a 5-0 advantage at the end of this distended, exhausting qualification series. Of course, football rarely delivers what one truly desires, and when the floodlights surrounding the empty Cam Pha Stadium flickered out minutes before kick-off, only to turn on and then go out again after two minutes of the game, one felt the night would unfold rather like how the rest of this qualification period had: that is, unexpectedly.
And so it did. Fifteen minutes after the pitch had disappeared into darkness, the lights flickered back to life, and within 10 minutes of the restart three players laid strewn while the ball pinged off various bulges in the scratchy turf, making the Matildas’ characteristic possession-style game all the more difficult to settle into. The never quite did.
These sputtering opening moments also saw an ominous foreshadowing of Vietnam’s first ever goal against Australia as Alanna Kennedy’s under-hit back-pass was almost intercepted by veteran striker Huynh Nhu, only for a barrelling Lydia Williams to thump clear. A goal for Sam Kerr on 14 minutes – a cushioned first-time volley from a curling Steph Catley cross – and another for Hayley Raso on 26 minutes, tapping home a squared pass from Kerr, were the inevitable end-points of Australia’s natural dominance.
But this strange time-warp of an evening took a turn as the fourth official held up her board indicating 16 additional minutes, accounting for the earlier blackout. Within three of them, Australia had earned a penalty after Caitlin Foord was flung, rugby-style, to the turf. But instead of Kerr stepping up to replicate her converted penalty in the first leg, it was Chloe Logarzo who was tasked with the job. Penalties have been a sore spot for the Matildas since being bundled out in a shootout against Norway at the World Cup, and those old ghosts haunted that small white dot once more as Logarzo’s effort was confidently palmed away by goalkeeper Tran Thi Kim Thanh.
Things began to deteriorate for Australia in the second half, and, Vietnam pulled a goal back through captain Huynh Nhu. In an almost mirror-image of Kennedy’s opening error, the rangy centre-back misjudged a back-pass near the half-way line – shinning it instead of meeting it cleanly with her foot – and allowed Nhu to nip in and lob Williams from outside the box. Judging by the reaction of the local photographers and the masked stewards in the stands, one wonders what this moment could have been had the coronavirus not forced the match to be played behind closed doors.
As Vietnam’s confidence lifted, Australia fell back into old habits of dysfunctional rotations as well as lack of improvisation in breaking down a deep defensive unit, and as the 80th minute ticked over and Foord clattered into the back of a Vietnamese midfielder half her size, it was clear the Matildas simply wanted the game to be over. There was a noticeable sigh of relief from the Australians as the full-time whistle echoed into the night.
It’s hard to know how to judge the game – and the Matildas’ qualifiers generally – in the context of the global events that have shaped it. How should expectations be tempered in the face of such tidal shifts, be they the footballing gulf between nations or the health epidemic disrupting the competition they met within? Do we do a disservice to Australia by, as they have said repeatedly, “just focusing on the football” without taking these interruptions into account?
A lot of questions will be asked of the Matildas as they, like the Tokyo Games themselves, stumble towards July. But one thing is certain: Australia enter their second consecutive Olympics with the best team they have ever produced, and with the best shot at winning a medal that they have ever had.
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