Matildas lose to England in World Cup semi-final: Ellie Carpenter’s vile social media abuse
Devastated Matildas star Ellie Carpenter has been subjected to vile online abuse in the wake of Australia’s cruel World Cup semi-final exit.
The Matildas’ brave loss to England in the World Cup semifinals has had an unsavoury postscript after star defender Ellie Carpenter was subjected to ugly attacks on social media.
Carpenter, one of Australia’s most popular players, was out-muscled in the lead up to England’s second goal as she endured a difficult night at Accor Stadium.
There was no excuse for what followed as gutless trolls launched into Carpenter on social media.
“Sick of you... you cost us the world cup final... go back to the kitchen now....” wrote one troll.
“How much did u (sic) get paid to throw the game,” asked one punter.
“You cost Australia the final. Garbage,” read another.
A third loosely pointed the finger at manager Tony Gustavsson, before sticking the boot into Carpenter.
“Don’t feel bad about tonight. It was your manager’s fault for keeping you ona fter you couldn’t complete a cross or forward runs/passes for the entire first 45 minutes,” the user said.
“Anyone else would’ve taken you off at halftime, your fatal f**k up was inevitable. His fault, not yours.”
It prompted calls to flood her Instagram account with supportive messages.
“Please can some of the Matildas fans go and show Ellie Carpenter some love on her instagram page?” wrote Amelia Sandy on the FIFA Women’s World Cup page on Facebook.
“She’s getting so many horrible, nasty hate comments and it just breaks my heart!
“It’s one thing to critique a player in private... but she’s getting comments like ‘this is why women shouldn’t play sport’ and ‘go back to the kitchen’.
“Just awful.”
It is understood Carpenter was forced to put restrictions on her social media accounts to stop the bile. - BRENT READ
SHATTERED MATILDA CALLED OUT OVER ‘COLOSSAL’ ERROR
Former Matilda Amy Chapman has unleashed on Australia’s defence after a couple of woeful moments gifted England a spot in the World Cup final.
Lauren Hemp and Alessia Russo did the damage late on as England shattered Australian dreams with a clinical 3-1 win in Sydney to set up a Women’s World Cup final against Spain.
But the pair took advantage of a couple of “colossal” errors from Ellie Carpenter in the area to silence the 75,000 strong crowd.
England deservedly took the lead nine minutes before the break with Manchester United’s Ella Toone unleashing a rocket just inside the box with the outside of her boot.
Sam Kerr, starting for the first time this tournament, hit back for the home side just after the hour with a world-class goal from 30-yards out that set the game on fire.
It sparked ecstatic scenes but the crowd were silenced just eight minutes later when Hemp muscled her way into the box and stabbed into the corner, before Russo put the icing on the cake with four minutes left of normal time.
Chapman didn’t hold back in her analysis.
”It’s some awful defending from the Australians,” she said on Optus Sport.
“Ellie Carpenter, not dealing with the initial ball in behind. It really shouldn’t have been anything at all. But Lauren Hemp, she’s hustled all evening, she’s been England’s best all evening and she puts that one away no troubles.
“I’m a big fan of Ellie but that’s a colossal mistake. A game-changing mistake from her not to deal with that and Hemp was there to pounce.”
SAM KERR’S ICONIC GOAL ‘WORTH NOTHING’
By Jamie Pandaram
It is now one of the most iconic sporting moments in Australian history, but Matildas coach Tony Gustavsson revealed that star striker Sam Kerr thinks her wonder goal against England in the World Cup semi-final was “worth nothing”.
Kerr produced one of the greatest goals in Australia’s football history, and has rivalled John Aloisi’s penalty and Cathy Freeman’s Olympic 400-metre sprint victory in the epic sporting moments in Stadium Australia, with her 63rd-minute long-ranger stunner.
Taking the ball from behind halfway, Kerr charged forward and then, with three defenders surrounding her, smashed the ball from well outside the box into the top left corner to equalise the game 1-all, before England scored two goals in the final 20 minutes to win.
“Knowing Sam, I think she probably thinks that goal was worth nothing, it wasn’t worth anything, she wants to win, she’s a winner,” Gustavsson said.
“I’m happy for her that she got that goal, I think it proves who Sam Kerr is and what she can do.
“I also know that she’s upset that missed the two chances at the end of the game, that’s how she’s wired, she always wants to score, she sees herself as always scoring the game-winner.
“She’s upset with that. We need to support her, she did everything she could tonight, she dug deep.
“Just the fact she was able to play 90 minutes is unreal, really.
“But it is a world-class goal and says a lot about the abilities that Sam does have.”
Kerr’s goal was all the more impressive given it was her first start this tournament after suffering from a calf injury, but Gustavsson was left reeling on match day when key defender Alana Kennedy was ruled out with illness.
“It seems to be one of those tournaments where curveball after curveball are thrown at us, the team have been tremendous in being able to adapt to whatever has been thrown at us,” Gustavsson said.
“At lunchtime today we got the notice from the medical team that Alana is ruled out, I had to make a last-minute change.
“We’ve done a lot of those this tournament, have been really good at dealing with it. Claire Polkinghorne, with her experience, mentally had no problem stepping in and playing the game, the challenge for her was she hasn’t played a game for a very, very long time coming back from a foot injury.
“So her coming back with limited game time, coming into this tournament, and also Sam with limited training time, we could see that those were two players who really needed to dig deep in the second half.”
Gustavsson said his team has no time to get down on their defeat, with the third-place playoff match against his native Sweden looming on Saturday in Brisbane.
“I said in the circle after the game, ‘It’s an extremely short turnaround to that game now, I know we’re emotional but we have no time to dwell on this one, we have a bronze medal game to play and we need to be ready’,” he said.
“They have 24 hours on us in terms of recovery, which might play a massive part in that game.”
England were extremely physical in the match and drew several fouls, but Gustavsson had no issue with the tussle.
“It was a great battle; hard, tough, no one shied away,” he said.
“Glad to have a referee out there to protect the players on both sides because it was brutal at times.
“It was an interesting tactical battle out there, everything from them wanted to shut down our left side.”
He added: “I’m really happy with the way the supporters and the fans supported the team in a very devastating and emotional moment after the game, and one reason they did that is they’re proud that all the players left it all out there.
“I said before the game that, ‘Make sure, no matter what, we leave it all out there’ and no one can complain on their effort tonight, they left it all out there.”
Trailing 1-nil at the break, Gustavsson told his players to unleash in the second stanza.
“At half-time I asked them to release the breaks and put more pressure on them than we did in the first half,” Gustavsson said.
“The second half might have been one of the better halves we played in the World Cup. You might be surprised to hear me say that when we conceded two goals but in terms of what it looked like in play, I think we did a phenomenal second half.
“I’ve said it before, it takes one moment, and England were much more clinical than we were in the finishing tonight.
“We had three series, so to speak, in the 82nd, 83rd and 84th minutes to score and go 2-2, then in the 86th minute, one ball in behind and it’s 3-1 and almost game over.”
TEAMMATES, LEGENDS REACT
Injured Australian star Elise Kellond-Knight has lamented the cruel end to the Matildas’ World Cup dream – and the game of inches that denied Sam Kerr her headline moment.
Kerr scored a goal-of-the-tournament contender, but ‘snatched’ at a couple of other chances that would’ve put Australia back in the tournament.
A mistimed header, and an even more gilt-edged offering that dropped to her inside the six-yard box but was fired wide, could’ve levelled the scores late in the piece.
But it wasn’t to be. And Kellond-Knight felt Kerr, the perfectionist, would be kicking herself as a result.
“Sam knows. I don’t want to talk about it too much - they were two critical chances,” Kellond-Knight said on Channel 7.
“It could’ve gone another way tonight if (not for) a few centimetres in that game.
“On one of them, even if she just left the ball... you could see her looking back going ‘I shouldn’t have touched that’.”
Australian great Heather Garriock lamented the result as ‘one that got away’ with the second-half chances that evaded the Matildas.
“It’s the one that got away to be honest,” Garriock said.
“England were the better team on the night. At the same time we had the quality and we had the chances.
“I think that we didn’t convert our chances. But at the end of the day you have to congratulate England. We have captured the imagination of the Australian public and the Matildas and football is on the map.”
A late tactical move by Gustavsson to shuffle right-back Ellie Carpenter into the central defence, replacing the recalled Clare Polkinghorne, was marked as curious by Kellond-Knight.
Carpenter was directly at fault for England’s second goal, when she failed to clear a seemingly harmless Lauren Hemp cross, and was further criticised for not coming out to pressure Hemp when she set up England’s third.
“It was an unusual substitution to take Polkinghorne off and reshuffle the back line at a crucial part of the game,” Kellond-Knight said.
Australia’s players turned their attention to Saturday night’s third-placed play-off against Sweden.
“It just sucks,” said midfield star Katrina Gorry.
“You feel like you let yourself down and your nation down. I know that we have the support of everyone and they will come out against the game against Sweden. But you never want to do that on home soil. Unfortunately it wasn’t our day.”
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