And just like that, the Matildas’ 2022 AFC Women’s Asian Campaign is over. It ended with a bang, delivered off the boot of Ji So-yun in the 87th minute of their quarter-final meeting with South Korea.
Australia are going home and make no mistake, their early exit represents a disastrous result for the Matildas. It cannot be sugar-coated.
Time and time again heading into the tournament, the repeated line was that the Matildas were in India to win it. Coach Tony Gustavsson said it, the players said it and, as Gustavsson revealed when announcing his squad, the federation had shifted its priorities to expect it.
But now, just over 12 months out from a home World Cup that represents Australia’s best-ever chance of staging a proper assault on a world championship, Gustavsson’s vaunted “performance mode” has proven incapable of eliminating one of Asia’s upper echelon. With qualification already secured as hosts, the Swede will enter 2023 with New Zealand – at the Tokyo Olympics – as his highest-ranked scalp inside 90 minutes of a competitive fixture.
Before the post mortem continues, it must be acknowledged that, on another day, the Matildas would likely have been able to put some of their multitude of chances away and the result could have been much different. Mary Fowler and Sam Kerr had back-to-back chances in the 19th minute. Kerr had a free header straight at keeper Kim Jung-Mi. Cho So-hyun yanked Steph Catley back on the hour mark as she advanced into the penalty area but VAR did not intervene. Kerr, inexplicably, sent a shot at an open goal wide in the 75th minute. A desperate Hayley Raso couldn’t turn in a wayward Kerr shot in the 91st.
Yet to place the narrative of the unlucky loser above all others would not only ignore the haphazard nature of the Matildas attempts to execute a discernible plan, but also remove agency from the Korean performance. It would be unhelpful.
Contentious as the VAR-adjudicated decision to award the penalty was, Cho blasted over the bar in the 37th minute. Then, as the Koreans began to exert increasing control over the flow of the game as the second half commenced – compounded by Gustavsson’s move to substitute off Clare Wheeler and shift Emily van Egmond into the six role – Lee Geum-min caught Alanna Kennedy flat-footed and forced a point-blank save from Lydia Williams. Five minutes later, Cho was afforded an open header in the penalty area that Williams, again, somehow managed to keep out.
After absorbing the Matildas’ initial 20-minute flurry, the Koreans looked like the more organised and better-prepared team: one that had picked out what Gustavsson’s more heralded XI was trying to achieve. Following the game, Korean coach Colin Bell said that the Matildas’ reminded him of the USWNT; perhaps inadvertently revealing that he has predicted the game plan of his opposite number, a former USWNT assistant.
Now, focus will and must turn to the tenure of Gustavsson. There will be time for lessons surrounding players and next steps, but they are subservient to the main issue. He came under increasing pressure during the sputtering run of friendly form during 2021, before staking everything on the Asian Cup, declaring that it would be the forum for adjudication.
Judgment is at hand. In the days and weeks ahead, Football Australia will have to decide if the 48-year-old’s plan, philosophy and personality can actually deliver in 2023, or if he is incapable of backing his silver tongue with tangible progression.
“I’ve been around long enough to know those questions are going to come from all over the place and that’s fair, that’s OK,” he said. “What I can promise is that I’ve been around long enough to come back from situations like this and learn from it and do better and that’s what I’m going to do if I get the chance to do it.”
Regardless of what conclusion is ultimately made, it will be vital that Football Australia be transparent about its reasoning. The discourse around the Matildas has frequently descended into toxicity – distracting from important discussions that should have been happening and negatively affecting player wellbeing – and it is imperative that the federation limits scope for conjecture and innuendo to drag it down again.
From there, even more essential is that FA commits wholeheartedly to its course of action.
If Gustavsson is to stay, the scrutiny that will follow must be welcomed and he must be backed to the hilt with any possible resources needed to succeed. In the event that a new coach is to be brought in, that resolution must come immediately – any delay and the new coach won’t have enough time to bed in their system, familiarise themselves with the players and take stock of the landscape before the World Cup rolls around. And they must receive similar backing.
Inevitably, Football Australia’s reputation will live or die on the decision, and neither comes with an assurance of success. In fact, the only certainty is that an unwillingness to properly commit to either shall result in disappointment.
