Montemurro explains midfield tweaks
Notably, Wheeler’s inclusion and Fowler’s shift to the No.10 role.
“She was a big miss for us the other night,” he tells the Paramount+ broadcast. “She wasn’t well, so we felt it was probably better to save her for the second game.
“We’re just trying to do something a little bit different with Mary Fowler in terms of pushing her inside a little bit more. Same sort of scenario, nothing too dramatic, and I probably want to just attack their line a little bit earlier with Hayley Raso.”
Matildas field almost identical line-up
Only two changes, with Hayley Raso and Clare Wheeler replacing Amy Sayer and Emily van Egmond.
At 16, Caitlin Foord just wanted one cap. Now she is set for her 150th
When former Matildas coach Tom Sermanni first asked a 15-year-old Caitlin Foord to start training with the senior team, he said she was so small he wasn’t sure she’d stick around.
“She looked like she’d blow away in a small wind,” he recalls.
It was the end of 2010 and Sermanni was preparing his team for the women’s World Cup in Germany the following year. Foord’s club coach at Sydney FC, Alen Stajcic, told Sermanni to invite Foord to camp.
“Six months before the World Cup she wasn’t even in my thought process for making the [squad],” Sermanni said.
Hello and welcome!
Or should I say welcome back? To where? The Matildas’ attacking third. A place of promise and despair. Of early dominance and many mistakes. It is the home of the “human beings” – coach Joe Montemurro’s explanation of how a group of world-class players could also be fallible in Saturday night’s 1-0 loss to Mexico.
“We didn’t score goals,” Montemurro said after the game. “The attacking third, I’ve said it many, many times: it’s so difficult to coach because it’s feeling … it’s the pressure on the ball, it’s the pass, it’s the decision, it’s the run.”
It’s also keeping the ball, which did not seem to be much of a thing in Newcastle. Lucky Australia have another chance! Tonight, in Sydney’s Commbank Stadium. The field of dreams. With a front third promising fantastical efficiency. This is the window of opportunity. It’s Caitlin Foord’s 150th cap and the Arsenal winger will captain. And either she or another will score long before Mexico can even fathom a 92nd-minute winner.
You heard it here first. Kick-off is at 7.10pm AEST. The one and only Frances Howe is at the game to witness the magic about to unfold in the flesh. I’ll make do with a stream on a screen. Here we go.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: www.smh.com.au
