“I can’t at this time give away too much – I keep it close to my chest.” With those words on Wednesday evening, barely 24 hours before Australia began their Women’s World Cup campaign with a narrow win over Ireland, Matildas coach Tony Gustavsson did nothing to hint at the bombshell he would later drop.
The question had not been intended to elicit anything of the magnitude of the news that would break the following day, that Sam Kerr would miss at least the first two matches of the tournament. It was an innocuous query, a request for a fitness update with two players – Tameka Yallop and Kyah Simon – known to be nursing injuries.
But with Kerr alongside him, knowing full well that she had suffered a calf injury during the team’s final training session on Wednesday morning, Gustavsson was tight-lipped. “Not only do I know my starting XI, but we also know the thoughts we have in terms of game-changers and plan for a finishing XI,” the Swedish coach said.
Kerr, as it turned out, would fall into neither camp. But with the world’s sports media amassed before her, the striker just stared blankly. A perfect poker face.
A day later, a few hours after Kerr’s injury had been made public, Gustavsson was not offering much more – beyond the fact that Kerr had been injured in a warm-up and had to walk away from training. “At the same time as I want to respect you having questions about it, I also want to respect Sam and the team,” he said.
Fair enough. But it does not exactly explain why Kerr’s injury was not disclosed for 24 hours, why the Matildas captain fronted the media at the pre-match press conference, answering questions as if nothing was amiss. “We have been very honest and not hide anything, to say that she’s going to be for out for two games, and then we’ll reassess afterwards,” Gustavsson added.
On one hand, the Matildas have acted entirely reasonably. It would give Ireland a significant tactical advantage to know that Kerr was to be missing; why give the opponents the upper-hand in such a critical match? “I want to ask for some understanding on that, considering it’s a World Cup,” Gustavsson said post-match. Team sheets are required to be lodged 90 minutes before kick-off – it was then, and only then, that the Australians had to disclose this heartbreaking revelation.
But there have been suggestions an element of subterfuge was employed. On Wednesday, it was business as usual for the Matildas. It was not until a tweet an hour and 17 minutes before kick-off that real picture emerged.
Withholding the late change certainly mitigated the impact on Australia, throwing a curve ball at the Irish who would have focused their preparations on controlling the Chelsea striker as best they could. In such a high-stakes elite sport, these one-percenters matter.
That has not stopped some critics. One sports writer sardonically captured the mood of the noisy minority when he tweeted: “Has lying Tony Gustavsson been arrested for his war crimes yet?” Football Australia’s head of communications simply replied with a popcorn emoji.
“I would not like to play poker against you,” joked Channel Seven interviewer Adam Peacock in his post-match interview with Gustavsson. The Matildas coach was conciliatory. “First of all I hope that you in the media understand and respect the decision we made not to say – I understand some people might be upset why we weren’t honest about it in the press conference,” he said. “But at that time we didn’t have all the answers either, we were waiting for some confirmation about scans at that time.” The final medical call came through at 9.30pm on Wednesday evening, Gustavsson said.
Matildas midfielder Kyra Cooney-Cross indicated that Kerr’s absence from the starting XI was confirmed to the team at lunch time on Thursday. “Obviously we were a bit upset – she’s our captain and she’s one of the best players in the world,” said Cooney-Cross. “But we can’t let that affect us.”
Cortnee Vine, whose place in the starting line-up was confirmed by Kerr’s absence, said that she had been warned on Wednesday evening. “We knew the day before – I had a bit of a heads-up that I might be playing,” Vine said.
Kerr will miss at least the next match, against Nigeria in Brisbane in a week’s time. But the Matildas will continue playing in her absence, while praying for their spiritual leader’s return. Thursday’s stand-in captain Steph Catley summed things up: “We’ll do everything we can to get as far as we can, and then hopefully we see Sam Kerr later on.”
