Australia and the US: the best of friends and enemies
Great friendships also spur great rivalries. Like these top 10 moments in US-Australian sporting contests.
1. AMERICA’S CUP SAILING
The 1983 triumph just might be Australia’s favourite sporting moment. For Bob Hawke conditionally calling your boss a bum if you couldn’t skip work for a day. For ripper characters like Bondy, Ben Lexcen and John Bertrand. For the winged keel. For Men at Work’s Down Under in the background. For the Boxing Kangaroo flag. For the funereal atmosphere at the New York Yacht Club when America’s 132-year Cup reign ended at the hands of Australia II. For the sheepishness of famously arrogant Liberty skipper Dennis Conner in defeat. It was so Australian. A rubber dinghy full of Swan beer and champagne pulled up alongside Australia II and Bond scrambled aboard to get the celebrations started. He was a larrikin and a fighter. At the time, it made him a national hero. “Don’t count us out,” he said at one press conference. “We had our backs to the wall at the battle of Gallipoli and we won that one.” Um, reminded that wasn’t exactly true, he changed tack in a heartbeat and said: “The point I meant to emphasise is that Australians hate to give up.” We haven’t won it since but the time we did … what a ripper.
2. OLYMPIC SWIMMING
The men’s 4x100m freestyle relay final at the Sydney Olympics. The most electrifying race and atmosphere I’ve ever seen. American Gary Hall Jr – a bit of a Dennis Conner for precociousness – said his team would “smash ’em like guitars”. By ’em, he meant the Australians: Michael Klim, Chris Fydler, Ashley Callus, Ian Thorpe. Klim started like a rocket, set a world record. Fydler and Callus did their jobs. Then came what we were waiting for: Thorpe versus Hall jnr for the gold medal. I’ll never forget it – the noise was through the roof. Walls shook. Tiles popped out of place at Sydney Aquatic Centre (no exaggeration). I thought the water might spilt out of the pool. Thorpe won by a fingernail. The very definition of a grandstand finish. The Australians played air guitar on the pool deck as Hall jnr bowed his head and walked away. Australia-US Olympic relays are still dynamite. Australia’s women have dominated in recent years and in the individual events, Australia’s Ariarne Titmus and Katie Ledecky are at each other’s throats in freestyle.
3. DAVIS CUP TENNIS
One from the archives.
Australia-America battles in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s were epic. See the famous black-and-white photos of jam-packed ties at Sydney’s White City and Melbourne’s Kooyong when Rod Laver, Ken Rosewall, John Newcombe and Tony Roche, among others, were slogging it out against Tony Trabert, Vic Seixas, Arthur Ashe, Stan Smith and a young John McEnroe, among other others. Spain and Russia now rule but the most successful nations in the 122-year history of the event are still the US (32 wins) and Australia (28).
4. BASKETBALL
Australia’s main team sports are cricket, Australian rules, rugby league and rugby union. America’s are gridiron, baseball and basketball. Only the latter overlaps. Australia’s men’s and women’s teams, the Boomers and Opals, are full of players mixing it with America’s best in the NBA and WNBA competitions. Olympic gold is the holy grail for Australian basketballers but to get there, they have to beat the Americans. No luck thus far. But it ain’t for the lack of trying.
5. BOXING
The ultimate for an Australian fighter is to win a world title by knocking an American on his backside in New York City’s Madison Square Garden or one of Las Vegas’s casinos. Boxing against any American is the big-time. When Sydney’s George Kambosos lost his world lightweight title to Vegas’s Devin Haney in Melbourne last weekend, it pulled a bumper crowd of 40,000 to Marvel Stadium … and attracted six million American viewers.
6. GOLF
Umpteen Australians mix it every week with America’s production line of professionals on the biggest tours in the world, the men’s PGA and women’s LPGA. Among the blokes, the biggest rivalry was Australia versus the US Masters before Adam Scott (right) broke the tournament’s curse in 2013. More recently, the ink is still dry on Perth’s Minjee Lee winning the US Women’s Open. It’s the most prestigious tournament in women’s golf and she’s climbed to No.3 on the world rankings. You’ve only really succeeded as a pro golfer when you’ve done the business in the US. Lee’s four-shot win over Californian Mina Harigae puts her in the firing line of all the Americans who don’t take kindly to international winners.
7. WATER POLO
Ferocious battles in a brutal sport. Australia versus the US resembles a bar-room brawl between moments of supreme skill. Scoreboard tension is normally a given and there’s been some rousing clashes over the years, including this year’s Intercontinental Cup. The Australian women’s ambush of the US for the gold medal at the Sydney Olympics was a classic. They’ll thrash and splash again at this month’s world championships at Budapest.
8. SURFING
The sport was dominated by Australians and Americans until Brazilians started dropping in. Hawaii is the epicentre of American surfing. Australians in the Rabbit Bartholomew era of the 1970s had to fight for respect. Rabbit had his teeth knocked down his throat. He was locked in the back of a truck with six ferocious dogs. His mate Ian Cairns kept a loaded shotgun in his car to protect himself. There were death threats and talk of contract killings until Eddie Aikau’s family brokered peace. From Mick Fanning’s engrossing world-titles battles against Kelly Slater to Steph Gilmore’s stoushes with Carissa Moore, Australia-America competitiveness is alive and kicking … if less violent than in Rabbits’ days.
9. FOOTBALL
The Matildas are one of Australia’s favourite sporting teams. The US doesn’t have a nickname but they’re high-profile and the best in the world. If the Matildas are to win next year’s Women’s World Cup, to be played in Australia and New Zealand, they’ll have to topple the Americans. Australia is ranked 11th but Sam Kerr is the best player on the planet, so there’s hope. There’s not much between them. In the playoff for bronze at the Tokyo Olympics, a seven-goal thriller could have gone either way until the US snatched a 4-3 win.
10. WINTER OLYMPICS
OK, so we’re not exactly hanging out for Australia’s next Winter Olympics rumble with America in men’s short track speed skating, but Steven Bradbury’s all-time classic victory at Salt Lake City in 2002 added an edge to the event every time it does come along. Because when Steven Bradbury did a Steven Bradbury, he did more than add a phrase to the sporting jargon. He won his gold medal by breaking American hearts. The beaten favourite who joined every other starter in crashing was a fellow by the name of Apolo Anton Ohno. Not sure if that was his surname before or only after the race.
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