The Matildas

Tonight the Matildas will play the game of their lives on their road to the world cup. I’m excited and nervous, even though I am a very new fan.

And I have a confession to make. I have never been into sport. Shock, horror, gasp! How can an Aussie NOT be into sport? I played sport in primary school. Netball and softball. But I was the player who tripped over and skun her knee on the cold asphalt surface. Netball in winter in Tasmania. I have scars.

My softball position was left outfield but the number of balls I didn’t catch still gives me nightmares so I think my teammates would have preferred I was Left Right Out. So in high school I found myself enjoying the life of the nerdy kid who read books, spent lunch hours in the music room playing my trumpet and dancing!

I never saw sport as something I would ever be good at and even if I was, I did kick a football further than my brother in primary school, there were limited opportunities for females to plan a career around sport.

My love of dancing was inspired by a girl in my neighbourhood who would organise neighbourhood kids to meet every night to rehearse for a concert. We danced and played cut out cardboard instruments to her record collection, dressed in amazing outfits she made for us. On trend for the seventies. When I think about it now, this was the best after school care before that term was even a term! We lived in a pretty rough neighbourhood, so this teenager’s ingenuity probably kept a lot of us out of trouble. There weren’t many opportunities. Especially for families with only one car. (Tasmania has never had great public transport.) It certainly made some wonderful memories and inspired a love for dancing and the music of the seventies! So at high school my friends and I would create routines and strutt our stuff in the privacy of the music department.

A couple of us eventually found dance classes, and it was dancing that lead me back to sport. Not as a player, but as a cheerleader for what was then, the state football league. The only role women had in football at that time.

It was during this time and later, as a police officer, I saw behind the scenes of sport, male sport, and what I saw and experienced made me very determined not to reward these men by watching them play. I know, irrational, perhaps. Sport was now something I didn’t play or watch. Well, I did play badminton, and I took up running, but other than that, sport was not part of my life. Well unless I was in Melbourne and going to the MCG to watch cricket and yes, even a football match to honour my parents who had recently passed. They did love their sport! ( I often wonder if I was adopted.)

So it wasn’t until my eldest granddaughter started talking about Sam Kerr, I took an interest.

My granddaughter took up soccer, she started wearing clothes with Sam Kerr’s name or picture on them and a soccer goal appeared in the yard. Her family even organised their holidays around games this Sam Kerr was playing in! There was even a selfie!

Time to investigate.

I quickly educated myself and discovered the Matildas. That’s what you get for banning sport from your screens and not having free to air television. I’d missed out on seeing the rise of this amazing group of women who not only play great soccer (football) they devote their time to being the role models they themselves didn’t have. Hence Sam Kerr and the Matildas are household names and even I will watch tonight as they play England in the World Cup Semi final.

I love how my granddaughters now have real role models in the world of sport. They certainly get a better opinion of sport than I did and the message, anything is possible with hard work.

But why are they so inspirational? And what’s that got to do with writing? They are inspirational because they truly care about the sport. Not from a position of ego, but from a position of inspiring others. They work hard and are at the top of their sport because they have grit. They want to win, but they want the team to live on when they retire. They work hard to be professional athletes and they demonstrate that girls from all backgrounds can aspire to be a part of a sports team. Some are mums who want to show professional sport doesn’t have to stop when you have children.

They have inspired many people, who, like me, have never taken an interest in sport. At the shop today a lively conversation was happening amongst a group of customers who were so pleased women’s sport was being played at this level and how much their children were enjoying it. The Matildas have created a buzz and they are showing us that hard work, determination and following your dreams may help you achieve them. Just having talent is not enough. You have to work on your craft, constantly improving and if you fall down, learn from it and move on.

So back to writing. Hard work, determination and following your dreams may work there too. Talent is not enough. You have to work on your craft, constantly improving. And if you fall down, learn from it and continue on.

Good luck Matildas! You truly are an inspiration, and not just to young girls. I saw an advert for walking soccer played locally. Am I game? Stay tuned!

Matildas, you rock!