Milicic ‘proud’ of Westfield Matildas' efforts against United States
Westfield Matildas head coach Ante Milicic says he can’t fault his players’ efforts during their thrilling loss to the United States.
Australia went down 5-3 to the reigning World Champions but took the lead just after half-time only for the Americans to run in four second-half goals in what turned out to be a shootout.
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Speaking to assembled media post-match, Milicic said he was impressed with the showing against the team atop the FIFA World Rankings.
“I can’t fault the efforts of the girls, I was very proud of them,” Milicic said.
“It was a fantastic experience for us and we look forward to moving on quickly.
“We always knew we were playing a very strong side, a side that’s been together a long time with a very experienced coaching staff.
"Obviously there were a lot of moments in transition but also in the wide areas of the field where they hurt us they’ve got a lot of quality.
“We tried to play our game, we went with our playing style and I thought there were patches where we did ok but with an opponent like this you get punished with every mistake and that happened tonight.”
Westfield Matildas veteran Lisa De Vanna opened the scoring for her side with an unstoppable strike after being played in by Sydney FC teammate Caitlin Foord.
Speaking to matildas.com.au, De Vanna echoed her coach’s thoughts while looking ahead to June’s FIFA Women’s World Cup France 2019.
“We played well in patches, obviously the USA are a very good team, very well organised and structured,’ De Vanna said.
“We’re still learning, still growing as a team...that doesn’t happen overnight so we’re going to give ourselves a bit of time and hopefully by the time we play Italy we will be fine.”