{"id":399401,"date":"2024-06-03T01:06:05","date_gmt":"2024-06-03T01:06:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=399401"},"modified":"2024-06-03T02:06:11","modified_gmt":"2024-06-03T02:06:11","slug":"80k-fans-on-a-monday-tillies-remarkable-pulling-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=399401","title":{"rendered":"80k fans on a Monday! Tillies' remarkable pulling power"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Matildas<\/a> will play their last match on home soil before the Paris 2024<\/a> against China in front of a sellout crowd at Accor Stadium in Sydney on Monday night.<\/p>\n

It's the 14th consecutive home match the Matildas have sold out.<\/p>\n

What makes this occasion even more remarkable is that it's a Monday night, in a city renowned for \ufeffslower ticket sales, only two days before the State of Origin<\/a> series-opener at the same venue.<\/p>\n

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Monday's match will double as the final opportunity for players to book their \ufeffseat on the plane to Paris, before the squad is announced on Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n

\"Kyra<\/p>\n

While the Tillies' boom in \ufeffpopularity in Australia was largely ignited by last year's home FIFA Women's World Cup, it reflects a broader global trend in the women's game.<\/p>\n

Speaking on Nine's Today<\/em> on Monday morning, Football \ufeffAustralia chief executive James Johnson said that while it was an "exiting time" for the game, such a boom also brought about fresh "challenges".<\/p>\n

A general increase in the length of club seasons, as well as longer international windows is putting more strain on the players than ever before.<\/p>\n

But as ticket sales continue to boom, administrators and coaches are left in an awkward position \u2013 give players the rest they need and rob fans of the opportunity to see their favourites on the pitch, or play them and risk an injury.<\/p>\n

\"General<\/p>\n

In Adelaide on \ufeffFriday night, the Matildas escaped with a 1-1 draw<\/a> after a late equaliser from veteran Michelle Heyman.<\/p>\n

Coach Tony Gustavsson had said before the match he remained undecided on four spots for the Olympics squad, and so fielded a largely experimental starting lineup.<\/p>\n

But it nearly backfired. Down 1-0 just after the hour mark, the Tillies were barely threatening the Chinese defence when Gustavsson finally pulled the trigger.<\/p>\n

He brought on Steph Catley, Caitlin Foord, Hayley Raso, Ellie Carpenter and Kyra Cooney-Cross at once. Their introductions transformed the match, although there still an element of luck in Heyman's equaliser<\/p>\n

\"Heyman<\/p>\n

Johnson suggested the decision to start with a weakened side doubled as a chance to ease strain on players.<\/p>\n

"There is a challenge with the women's calendar at the moment because of the growth of the women's game, both at club level and national team," he said.<\/p>\n

"The solution though, is we need to ensure that as far as our high performance goes of our team, that we're sharing the match minutes around the players.<\/p>\n

"That's why sometimes you don't see the strongest 11 play 90 minutes of football every time there's an international window."<\/p>\n

Kickoff for Monday's match is at 7.40pm AEST.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Matildas will play their last match on home soil before the Paris 2024 against China in front of a sellout crowd at Accor Stadium […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":399406,"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\/399401"}],"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=399401"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":399415,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399401\/revisions\/399415"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/399406"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=399401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=399401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=399401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}