Matildas move sending the wrong message: ‘What good has it done?’
One of Australia’s leading football commentators has criticised the decision to shift a Matildas Olympic qualifying match to a bigger stadium.
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Football commentator Simon Hill has challenged the decision to shift an upcoming Matildas’ match to a bigger stadium.
Australia’s Olympic qualifier against the Philippines in Perth next month has been moved from the 22,000-seat HBF Park to the 60,000 capacity Optus Stadium.
It was hailed by Football Australia as a sign of the Matildas’ skyrocketing popularity in the wake of the Women’s World Cup, but Hill has suggested the move is sending the wrong message.
“I’m going to go against popular opinion here,” he wrote on Twitter.
“I understand there’s huge demand for tickets, but the more we shift games to oval venues because of bigger capacity (same with the Socceroos btw), the more the message sinks in that we don’t really need proper ️(football) specific facilities.”
“We’ve got to start fighting properly for what we need,” he added, in a series of replies.
“(We) don’t need larger️ (football) facilities. (We) need more (football) ️specific facilities. “We’ve played on ovals for decades to make some $ – what good has it done? Why we do we keep doing the same thing & expecting a different result?
“You start small – pack out the boutique venues (there’s work to do on this in the club game), and then look to increase capacity. It’s the template all over the world … except here. See what the US are doing with their MLS venues – most are around the 20-30k mark. Perfect.”
The Australian team will play the Philippines at 3pm on Sunday, October 29, at the biggest venue in the state.
It means an extra 40,000 people will be able to see the Matildas, and Sam Kerr, in action with a spot in Paris up for grabs.
The venue shift comes after the Matildas opening World Cup clash against Ireland was moved to Stadium Australia where a sellout crowd of 75,784 fans watched the home team win 1-0.
Football Australia boss James Johnson said the World Cup demonstrated the “drawing power” of the Matildas with almost 450,000 fans attending matches including the send-off match against France and their tournament fixtures.
“The Matildas are one of the strongest sporting brands in the country, and it has become strongly evident that passionate support for this iconic team continues to grow and, for the second time in 12 months, because of the popularity of the CommBank Matildas, we need to relocate to a venue with a higher capacity to accommodate the demand,” Johnson said.
The match will be the first for the Matildas in Perth since 2018 – when they played Thailand in a friendly in the lead up to the 2018 AFC Women’s Asian Cup.
For local hero Kerr it’s a career highlight to be able to take her team to the biggest venue the state has to offer.
“I’m sure the Perth people will be out in force to watch the Matildas,” Kerr said.
“It’s been a while and we get three games so we‘re really lucky.
“I can’t wait to go back there and play in front of friends, family, and then all the West Australians that didn’t get the Tillis over there.”
The Matildas other Olympic qualifiers will be against Chinese Taipei and IR Iran and will remain at HBF Park, played from October 26 to November 1.
– with NCA Newswire
Originally published as Matildas move sending the wrong message: ‘What good has it done?’
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