{"id":317145,"date":"2023-07-18T07:02:13","date_gmt":"2023-07-18T07:02:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=317145"},"modified":"2023-07-19T00:03:47","modified_gmt":"2023-07-19T00:03:47","slug":"emotional-matildas-treated-to-cathy-freeman-surprise","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=317145","title":{"rendered":"'Emotional' Matildas treated to Cathy Freeman surprise"},"content":{"rendered":"

Matildas<\/a> veteran Aivi Luik has shared an "emotional" full circle moment that she and her teammates were treated to on the eve of the FIFA Women's World Cup<\/a>, thinking it was just another meeting with coach Tony Gustavsson.<\/p>\n

Luik and the Matildas had a special visit from Australian Olympic gold medallist Cathy Freeman<\/a> OAM while in Melbourne, who spoke candidly to the 23 women representing Australia on home soil.<\/p>\n

"We actually had a meeting scheduled around 6.30 and we thought 'alright Tony (Gustavsson) will take this'\ufeff," Luik said on Tuesday, from the Matildas' Brisbane training camp.<\/p>\n

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"We plodded all in there, sat down on our chairs and he (Gustavsson) mentioned that whilst these tournaments require a lot of tactics, it also requires a lot of belief and a lot of heart, so that we were going to take a little bit of a turn and do something a bit different.<\/p>\n

"They played a three minute highlight reel on YouTube of the moment of Cathy Freeman\ufeff's race.<\/p>\n

"By the end of it, there was a lot of emotion going around the room.<\/p>\n

"When they turned the lights on, we turned around and there she was."<\/p>\n

https:\/\/twitter.com\/TheMatildas\/status\/1680772765459288064<\/a><\/p>\n

Freeman generously gave her evening to discuss the "pressures" of having "the weight" and expectation placed on you by your country, as the Matildas prepare to compete in the biggest women's sporting event in history<\/a>, on home soil.<\/p>\n

"We had a bit of a chat to her about how she dealt with pressures, because obviously she had\ufeff the weight of the nation on her shoulders," Luik said.<\/p>\n

"We came away from that feeling a bit of a weight off our shoulders … and just, completely inspired."<\/p>\n

But as the night went on, the Matildas realised that Freeman's visit wasn't just any old surprise. It had been years in the making.<\/p>\n

\"BRISBANE,<\/p>\n

"A couple of years ago we were going through some questions about who your sporting hero is and why … over half the team said that Cathy Freeman was their hero," Luik said.<\/p>\n

"I'd come to find out later that the staff tried to get her in. A lot of girls were very emotional.<\/p>\n

"Bless her heart, she doesn't do a lot of public speaking\ufeff. She did that for us."<\/p>\n

As for what lies ahead for the Matildas, there are still concerns for Tameka Yallop, who injured her knee in the warm-up match victory over France in Melbourne.<\/a><\/p>\n

"It's a cruel game sometimes," teammate Clare Wheeler said on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\"BRISBANE,<\/p>\n

\ufeff"Meeks is doing what she needs to do to be available on Thursday."<\/p>\n

But there is work to be done and the side remains solely fixed on their tournament opener against Ireland in Sydney on Thursday.<\/p>\n

"It's important to not get ahead of yourself, that's why we're focused on the Ireland game and just the Ireland game. Everything in the lead up\ufeff has been towards that," Luik said.<\/p>\n

"Staying in the moment is very, very important."<\/p>\n

The Matildas face Ireland in their first group stage match of the FIFA Women's World Cup on Thursday night at Stadium Australia.<\/p>\n

For a daily dose of the best of the breaking news and exclusive content from Wide World of Sports, subscribe to our newsletter by<\/strong><\/em> clicking here<\/strong><\/em><\/a>!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Matildas veteran Aivi Luik has shared an "emotional" full circle moment that she and her teammates were treated to on the eve of the FIFA […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":317147,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317145"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=317145"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317145\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":317150,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317145\/revisions\/317150"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/317147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=317145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=317145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=317145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}