The biggest day in Australian sport for years

If Shakespeare was right and the miserable have no medicine except hope, here Sam Kerr is for a game of soccer that isn’t quite death or glory, but feels like it anyway.

Happy captain Sam Kerr during Matildas training in Brisbane on Sunday. Picture: Chris Hyde/Getty Images

Five million TV viewers. Thirty thousand in the crowd. Sam Kerr’s comeback. I cannot recall a bigger night for Australian sport in years. The Matildas’ World Cup legacy is at stake.

“A bit harsh,” is Kerr’s response to that. She says the tournament is a winner just by being in Australia. She says her side has irreversibly captured the public’s heart, mind, soul and imagination. These are fair points and yet you have to assume the long-term impact of the Cup will be damaged if the Matildas are eliminated early. Cathy Freeman didn’t inspire a generation of Olympians by bombing out in the heats.

The Matildas must beat Canada at Melbourne’s AAMI Park on Monday night or their Cup campaign is finished. Can you believe it? It ain’t over yet, of course, and they have their captain back.

How beautiful are the boots that offer hope. Kerr slipped into pink ones and did a spot of training with the team in Brisbane on Sunday morning. What kind of training?

“It depends what you mean, trained with a team,” secretive Matildas coach Tony Gustavsson said.

Kerr may play 10 minutes, 90 minutes, half an hour. “It will come down to the wire,” Gustavsson said of the call to be made about her involvement.

“I’m going to be there,” Kerr says matter-of-factly. “I’m going to be ready.”

If Shakespeare was right and the miserable have no medicine except hope, here she is for a game of soccer that isn’t quite death or glory, but feels like it anyway. The Matildas were devastated after the loss to Nigeria in Brisbane but Kerr’s availability has put a spring in their step. To AAMI Park they go. A most fevered pitch.

“It’s a unique situation, but it’s not unique for us,” says Ellie Carpenter.

“I feel like we always have our backs against the wall and that’s when we’re at our best. It’s a do-or-die game and we all know we have to leave everything out there. Sam is a massive boost … she’s a world-class striker. She’s our captain. She’s our leader on and off the field. To have her available is the biggest boost that we can have.”

Kerr and her electric pink boots will try to do for Australia what Cleopatra did for Egypt. Save it. She’ll try to do for her weeping, wounded mates what Wonder Woman has always done for hers. Rescue ’em. She’ll try to do for an army of Matildas fans – a crowd of 50,000 plus an estimated Australian TV audience of five million – what Florence Nightingale did for Londoners. Cure their ills. Joan of Arc kicked a few goals for France in the Hundred Years’ War and there’s time for Kerr to do likewise for Australia in a one-month tournament that hasn’t felt right without her.

Sam Kerr in her electric pink boots at Matildas training in Brisbane. Picture: Chris Hyde/Getty Images

I. Am. Playing. That’s what Kerr told Gustavsson after the Brisbane defeat. Stuff the fitness test. I’m playing. And she knows we’ll be watching. “The crowds have been absolutely unbelievable,” she says. “The fans at our hotel, walking down the street, people making us coffee – literally everyone has been so supportive and we can feel the love, and the girls thrive under that. Whatever the crowd wants to bring in Melbourne, we‘re willing to accept it. We need them and that’s the reason we play.”

It normally takes four sudden-death victories from the round of 16 to win a World Cup. The Matildas are telling themselves they just have an extra all-or-nothing game to get through. There’s going to be delirium or devastation at full-time. Kerr’s Matildas have 90 minutes to kick on or get the boot.

She’s an interesting character. There’s a rebellious and defiant streak. It’s like she wants to stick it up the critics when, really, she doesn’t have any. Her confidence and self-assuredness and optimism and strut and joy and fight are palpable. Contagious. The Matildas looked and sounded a different team when they arrived in Melbourne. All because of those three simple words from their captain. I. Am. Playing.