Soccer is not one of the most popular sports in Australia and New Zealand, and the conditions are often still poor, especially for women’s soccer. Players and fans hope that the World Cup, which begins tomorrow, will change that.
The Matildas’ fan club has already practiced the chants. Matildas – that’s what the women’s national soccer team is called in Australia. Majella Card will watch 12 games in a yellow fan t-shirt. She suspects that many people in Australia underestimate how big the tournament will be.
Because in Australia many play football as a hobby. But Australians prefer to watch other sports on TV – rugby, Australian football or netball.
The popularity of football only grew with the immigration of people from football-loving countries, says Card, citing Italy, Croatia, Serbia and Greece as examples.
Ahead of the tournament, the excitement among Matildas fans is high – they hope the World Cup will bring more exposure to the sport as a whole.
Not a classic sport?
Football has long had the stigma of not being a “real” Australian sport. In addition, women’s football was banned in Australia and New Zealand for a long time – half a decade. Women were not allowed to play again until the 1970s.
New Zealand quickly tried to make up for lost time. In Australia it took longer because of financial problems. Australia’s national team players even posed naked for a calendar in 1999. Nevertheless, the women’s football association of Australia went bankrupt.
Football coach Thomas Kenny speaks of “horror stories” – of girls’ teams “that don’t even have balls and pitches”. Kenny campaigns for young female talent in Australia.
Eleven-year-old Emmie is one of them. She is correspondingly excited before the tournament, after all it is “maybe the only time in my life that I will see a World Cup in Australia”. And of course she dreams of “later playing for the Matildas herself”.
Her coach says she has a chance. She is already on the pitch every day.
For promotional purposes, the Football Association of New Zealand hosted a game of local girls’ teams ahead of the World Cup against the scenic backdrop of Mount Aoraki/Mount Cook.
Investments are effective
Maia Jackman could only dream of such a promotion in her youth. The 48-year-old is a former player for the New Zealand women’s national team.
In the first ten years, she “only played in boys’ teams,” she says – “there were no girls’ teams.”
But something has changed in Australia and New Zealand over the decades. You just had to put more money into women’s football, says Jackman, which made the teams better and more visible. Today, women’s football is much more professional.
More money, more funding and, above all, more enthusiasm from the World Cup in your own country – that should make women’s football even more popular in Australia and New Zealand.