After a disappointing loss to Canada on the weekend in Brisbane, coach Tony Gustavsson is urging fans to stick with the plan going forward.
The Matildas will get a rematch against the world’s seventh-ranked team tonight, the first football match to be played at the new Allianz Stadium in Sydney.
Gustavsson said that the support shown at Suncorp Stadium in the 1-0 defeat was encouraging.
“They obviously have an understanding of the process,” he said of the fans.
“As everyone, they also want to get the momentum, right? So it’s natural that they want some results as well.
“But because they have a better insight of why we are where we are, and what we are doing, maybe there’s a little bit more patience there than outside the federation.”
The coach said that above everything else, belief was the most important thing.
“At the end of the day, we all need to believe. If you don’t believe in this team, it’s not going to be a success at the World Cup.”
The Matildas have struggled mightily over the past two years; losing more games than they won in 2021 and crashing out of the Asian Cup in the quarter-fiinals against South Korea.
A recent 7-0 flogging at the hands of Spain increased the pressure on the coach.
He said that, sometimes, it just took one positive result to turn the ship around – and a win over the Olympic champions tonight would be a massive confidence booster.
“I know some of you might be sick and tired of me saying this – but internally, we know what we’ve done,” he said.
“We know where we are and there’s a belief in the process and I don’t think that belief is going to be lost, even if we lose the game.
“We’d be more worried if the game didn’t look good or if the performance is not there or if we were not playing the way we wanted to play.”
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