Gustavsson speaks about belief over expectation after second loss to Canada

After an early goal to Mary Fowler and a solid 45-minutes from the CommBank Matildas, it was ultimately Canada who reigned victorious at Allianz Stadium, with head coach Tony Gustavsson speaking to media post-match.
 

One player who made an impact again this game was Cortnee Vine with journalists questioning Gustavsson's decision to sub her off.

"I communicated before the game that Vine, Foord and Yallop were all planned subs in cooperation with the SSSM (Sport Science Sport Medicine) team and they had between 45 to 60 minutes to be evaluated.

"At halftime, Vine did a strength test and she had lost 15% of strength in her hammy and couldn't, which was unfortunate, because she had a really good first half."

WATCH: Key Moments - Australia v Canada - Allianz Stadium

With such a bright start to the match after Mary Fowler scored a goal in the third minute, Gustavsson was asked where he thought the CommBank Matildas went wrong in the second half.

"It's frustrating because we felt those first 45 minutes were maybe the first time in a very long time, where we performed consistently for 45 minutes in a row. We've seen patches before, as I've spoken about, five minutes here, seven minutes there," he said.

"This was 45 minutes of complete performance, where we were actually dominating Canada, Olympic Champions, and we had six starters from the Olympics, not even available going into the game and that felt so good. Then in halftime, we said, we know exactly what's going to happen. Canada have nothing to lose, they're gonna go out and really press us. We need to be ready for it. We need to play faster but I don't think we were really ready.

"They caught us a bit there, we didn't match their speed of press with our speed of play. And I've said before we have the ability to play but we don't play fast enough, so we started to get dispossessed more often," Gustavsson continued.

"I hope that those outside saw some improvement in terms of the fact that we can dominate the top team, not just compete with them. I hope that can be looked upon as an improvement and also to be able to do that with six key players out.

"I hope that you guys can see that maybe, a year and a half ago, if we played a Canada with six key injuries, we wouldn't have been able to dominate them like we did for 45. I don't want to sit and protect myself. But that's how I look at it. That's an improvement.

"We still have a ways to go in terms of the World Cup, we need to put a 90-minute solid performance together."

Playing her first match of the series after injury, Caitlin Foord echoed the head coaches thoughts.

"I think Tony said it right about the first half. How it looked, is how it felt for us as well. We felt like we were dominating. We felt like us again, we felt like we were playing well and we were a bit unlucky, not the score a couple more," she said

"We don't have that much time together, leading into the World Cup, so that's why these moments like that 45, are really important to build on. We want to take that momentum into the next game and learn from obviously the second 45 as well."

When asked about the disappointment felt from fans who want to see the CommBank Matildas win, Gustavsson said he still believes the Australians could become one of the best teams in the world.

"I've said it before, and I'll say it again, I think it's the difference between expectations and belief and I say that from other experience from coaching both men's teams and women's teams and both club and country, that it's a huge difference between expectations and belief," he said.

"When I took over I actually believed that this team, in the future, could become one of the best teams in the world. We're not there. Now, we need to be real. We're not the best team in the world right now. But we know when we play our best, we can beat the best team in the world in a one off, especially if all our players available.

"I love that we want to be winners and we need to keep believing in the team."

The CommBank Matildas will play again on home soil in November when they take on Sweden.

CommBank Matildas v Sweden
Date: Saturday, 12 November 2022
Venue: AAMI Park
Kick-Off: 2:45 pm AEDT
Tickets are available now