Speaker 1: We'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the land
Speaker 1: on which this podcast was produced, the Gadigle people of
Speaker 1: the or nation. We pay our respects to Elder's past
Speaker 1: and present.
Speaker 2: It's the year two thousand and we're with the sports
Speaker 2: obsessed Lydia Williams, who is glued to her TV. The
Speaker 2: twelve year old is fixated as the Olympics takeover Sydney.
Speaker 2: Kathy Freeman wins gold for Australia in a four hundred
Speaker 2: meter sprint. She watches on as Kathy wraps herself in
Speaker 2: the Aboriginal flag during her victory lap. Something clicks in
Speaker 2: Lydia's mind. Women can have a career in sports. A
Speaker 2: First Nations woman can be a national heal.
Speaker 3: Thanks and that the Maxieldas are better and football is
Speaker 3: better for having had Lydia Williams inn.
Speaker 2: But her path to success won't come without its struggles.
Speaker 2: I'm Att Middleton and this is head game today. While
Speaker 2: Lydia Williams was saving goals, the Matildas and the power
Speaker 2: teamwork were saving her. Lydia Williams, I have a Matilda
Speaker 2: in the building. Long time I see Lydia. I bumped
Speaker 2: into yesterday at the Logis and at the Logis after party,
Speaker 2: and here we are today. How we've made it, I
Speaker 2: don't know, but it's great to see you. How are you,
Speaker 2: oh man?
Speaker 3: It's because we're both rock stars. That's how we made it.
Speaker 2: Do you know what we are? And we lived like
Speaker 2: rock stars yesterday. But it's great to have you on.
Speaker 2: I remember seeing you last night, and yes, we were
Speaker 2: on the podcast tomorrow and I was super excited to
Speaker 2: not only see you, but to have you on because
Speaker 2: cod talk about a phenomenal career and talk about head game,
Speaker 2: you know, having the mindset of an elite athlete. It's
Speaker 2: something that takes discipline, it takes ructure, it takes years
Speaker 2: of experience to get to where you where you've been
Speaker 2: in your career has been phenomenal. But take me back
Speaker 2: to the very beginning when you were a little child
Speaker 2: and you were running around the field or whatever you're doing.
Speaker 2: Where did you Where were you born and where did
Speaker 2: you just what was your family life like growing up?
Speaker 3: Yeah? Well, I was born in Katanning, which is a
Speaker 3: small really small town in w A. And then we
Speaker 3: moved to Calgouli when I was eighteen months and that's yeah.
Speaker 3: So that's where I actually grew up. And Kalgouli is
Speaker 3: the biggest goal mining town in Australia of a big
Speaker 3: population of thirty thousand people. And you know, there's a town,
Speaker 3: but then surrounding it's red dirt desert, just barrenness.
Speaker 2: Did you move there?
Speaker 3: Well, it's biggest city than Catana.
Speaker 2: That wasn't a career move for your parents. Let's move
Speaker 2: to a bigger city.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And yeah, that's just kind of how I lived
Speaker 3: my life is you know, sport was always on the weekends,
Speaker 3: as you kind of do in small country towns and everything, like,
Speaker 3: you have a really good foundation of family and friends,
Speaker 3: and weekends are dedicated to being outside and doing that.
Speaker 3: So that's really how I found my love for sport
Speaker 3: and passion for just being active. But my mum, she's American.
Speaker 3: She grew up in America, ended up going and working
Speaker 3: on Wall Street before coming to Australia to you, yeah,
Speaker 3: to work as a missionary in the middle of the
Speaker 3: desert to help indigenous women with domestic violence, drug and
Speaker 3: alcohol abuse. So she left, yeah, the bright lights of
Speaker 3: New York City to live in a tent and to
Speaker 3: you know, help out people that needed it a little
Speaker 3: bit more. And my dad that's where they met.
Speaker 2: They met was so she went from the bright lights
Speaker 2: to you know, from training to to living in a tent.
Speaker 3: Yeah wow, and just helping women in the night that
Speaker 3: needed help and somewhere safe to stay and whatever they needed.
Speaker 3: Be kind of that that person for them. And my
Speaker 3: dad he kind of, I guess, had a different upbringing
Speaker 3: than my mum. He didn't know his father and he
Speaker 3: was born and a part of the stolen generation. So
Speaker 3: during that time, his grandparents raised him and they would
Speaker 3: hide him so he didn't get taken away because some
Speaker 3: of his siblings got separated from him and went to missions,
Speaker 3: and his grandfather was making sure that whenever the police
Speaker 3: came into town or any counsel, you know, he would
Speaker 3: hide him and make Dad hide in the bush and
Speaker 3: make sure that he didn't get taken away as well. Wow.
Speaker 2: So and how did they raise you, Well.
Speaker 3: It was obviously a lot of difficulties and struggle they
Speaker 3: had within their marriage. Of all of a sudden, it
Speaker 3: was a very white American woman marrying a very dark
Speaker 3: indigenous bush like man, and so from both sides of
Speaker 3: the family they had to deal with a lot of racism.
Speaker 2: And you did you did you see.
Speaker 3: That or no? By the time I came around, it
Speaker 3: was yeah, they were you know, madly in love and
Speaker 3: dealt with a lot of that that struggle. I kind
Speaker 3: of saw them all from my dad's point of view.
Speaker 3: Is I'm more white presenting than what my dad's color was.
Speaker 3: So when I'd be at football or we'd be walking
Speaker 3: out around the street and you know, like my dad
Speaker 3: will be holding my hand or whatever it was, you
Speaker 3: get you know, you get double looks or people you know,
Speaker 3: my dad's watching. You'll be like, oh, is that your dad?
Speaker 3: Oh who's that black man watched? Like watching the game?
Speaker 3: Like is he okay?
Speaker 2: There's something that's completely normal to you. Was just being
Speaker 2: thrown at you in little little segments like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And it's like almost like what I would say,
Speaker 3: kind of like naivety of racism, Like it's just casual
Speaker 3: racism being thrown out. But for me, it was like
Speaker 3: I don't understand why I have to keep explaining that
Speaker 3: that's my dad, Like don't we look alike? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Yeah, you must be relentless and must be horrible to
Speaker 2: keep doing that. And also it highlights the fact of racism, right,
Speaker 2: it's there in your face, you know, you think you
Speaker 2: know it's casual racism or people just at it's like wow,
Speaker 2: actually when you look at it, for you to keep
Speaker 2: chipping away. You like that from such a young.
Speaker 3: Age and it really affected me, I think when I
Speaker 3: was early teens, because I was white presenting, but I
Speaker 3: had a desert slang and we spent every year, we
Speaker 3: spent at least a month out in the desert where
Speaker 3: I'd camp under the stars, learned how to light a fire,
Speaker 3: learn all about desert culture, bush life, elders, everything Aboriginal
Speaker 3: and indigenous that I could think of. And then I'd
Speaker 3: come and be in calculate a town and I'd have
Speaker 3: all these desert behaviors and it wasn't obviously accepted by,
Speaker 3: you know, people that weren't familiar with it. But then
Speaker 3: also because I was white presenting, then like if a
Speaker 3: black person saw me, then they'd you know, be double
Speaker 3: look as well. So it was almost like people knew
Speaker 3: me because of my parents, but if you just looked
Speaker 3: at me, you wouldn't really know what your culture, where
Speaker 3: are you from? And I really had kind of an
Speaker 3: identity struggle of I just wanted to be one or
Speaker 3: the other and I couldn't. It was like not accepted
Speaker 3: either way.
Speaker 2: And how did that affect your relationship with Did you
Speaker 2: take one side or the other or were you just
Speaker 2: trying to find out who you know where you sat? Really?
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think it was more like trying to figure
Speaker 3: out where I sat. When when I was eleven, we
Speaker 3: moved to Canberra as a family, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: my desert lingo was. You know, I was in bush
Speaker 3: of like a lot of trees and there was no
Speaker 3: red red dirt. It was like grassland and mountains and
Speaker 3: it was really cold and so like that was a
Speaker 3: really big culture shock to me. But then I still
Speaker 3: had a desert like twang. So all of a sudden
Speaker 3: things I would normally say or do or how I
Speaker 3: would sound now I've had to change how I speak
Speaker 3: to people because they wouldn't understand me.
Speaker 2: Got you so?
Speaker 3: And then during that time as well, I'm a you know,
Speaker 3: young adolescent girl, and I don't want anything to do
Speaker 3: with my dad because he doesn't know anything about you know,
Speaker 3: female hormones or anything like that. So then all of
Speaker 3: a sudden, I've become I guess more white. But I'm
Speaker 3: also in a culture or an area that I don't
Speaker 3: get to, you know, express my indigenous heritage that much.
Speaker 2: What was that like growing up? How would you? Were
Speaker 2: you jumping between two identities? Were you? Were you sort
Speaker 2: of questioning who you were? Was? It was tough? Yeah?
Speaker 3: It was tough. And during that time, when I was fifteen,
Speaker 3: my dad actually got really sick and fifteen yeah, so
Speaker 3: in the in the midst of all this identity crisis
Speaker 3: and you know, going through hormonal changes and just enjoying
Speaker 3: being a teenager, my dad gets sick and within three
Speaker 3: weeks of diagnosis it was he's got cancer to he
Speaker 3: only has one day to live.
Speaker 2: Oh wow. So he got diagnosed and within three weeks
Speaker 2: he was no longer. Yeah, oh sorry to you that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, no, it's I've processed it a lot, but you
Speaker 3: know then that was an extra bit of.
Speaker 2: I yeah, a big bit on top. Right. So not
Speaker 2: only you going through this struggle with yourself, but then
Speaker 2: that lands on your lap. Wow, and you sound like
Speaker 2: you were really close for your dad.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean like my whole I kind of say,
Speaker 3: like my whole childhood in Kalgarouli and growing up was
Speaker 3: my dad was like I just loved everything about it.
Speaker 3: He taught me all about the land. You know, I
Speaker 3: talking to my mum. Now there's so much of me
Speaker 3: that is my dad. So I think we have a
Speaker 3: really big connection even through his passing, but then moving
Speaker 3: to to Canberra and being in like a more I
Speaker 3: guess white collar area, then I you know, drift to
Speaker 3: my mom's side. So then really it was kind of
Speaker 3: when when dad got really sick and passed away, it
Speaker 3: was like, oh, there's there's a whole part of me
Speaker 3: that felt like missing. Wow.
Speaker 2: So your dad taught you, like you said, you know,
Speaker 2: how to live in the verse, you know, to make
Speaker 2: a five, et cetera, et cetera, you know all that
Speaker 2: good their heretiage stuff that that that you loved. Who
Speaker 2: taught you to to kick a football?
Speaker 3: It was my dad. Yeah, he loved growing up playing
Speaker 3: He was actually a fl loved AFL. So I remember
Speaker 3: we go to pub in Kagarli and I'm like a
Speaker 3: little six to eight year old and we'd go into
Speaker 3: a pub and meete whoever West Coast Eagles person was there,
Speaker 3: and Dad would be like, hey, she's going to be
Speaker 3: playing sport one day and blah blah blah, and yeah
Speaker 3: Dad was a real, real big, I guess, advocate of
Speaker 3: me being outside and playing sport. Mum was very big
Speaker 3: on education, but both were really big on supporting me.
Speaker 2: And what age were you at when you started really
Speaker 2: enjoying Is it soccer or football? Here is soccer football?
Speaker 3: Yeah, we have the World Cup, so it has to
Speaker 3: be football.
Speaker 2: Yeah. What age did you actually realize I'm pretty good
Speaker 2: at this and I want to take this seriously or
Speaker 2: it was you just a kid kicking a ball around
Speaker 2: and you just played for a team. How did it
Speaker 2: progress into the obviously the phenomenal career that you've had,
Speaker 2: which we touched on, but how did it progress into you,
Speaker 2: you know, getting your first sort of serious contract to
Speaker 2: rolling into represent your country.
Speaker 3: Oh it's actually mum. So I went when we first
Speaker 3: came to Canberra, I came late to registration and basically
Speaker 3: they were like, do you want to be in Division
Speaker 3: one but there's only a goalkeeper position left? Or Division
Speaker 3: four and you can play wherever. And I was like,
Speaker 3: why would I ever go to Division four? Yeah? So
Speaker 3: I was like, yeah, we'll rotate, and it just we're
Speaker 3: not rotating and I remember I went to a goalkeeping
Speaker 3: clinic in Canberra which had about maybe thirty goalkeepers and
Speaker 3: only a handful of girls within that, and the goalkeeper
Speaker 3: instructor or coach whatever it was, he actually was an
Speaker 3: ex previous soccer US coach and unbeknownst to me, he
Speaker 3: actually went up to my mom at the end of
Speaker 3: the whole clinic and he's told her, whatever you do,
Speaker 3: do not let her quit. Out of everyone here, she
Speaker 3: has the most potential to be a professional and make
Speaker 3: it for a very long career, so don't let it quit.
Speaker 3: So I think that was just kind of something that
Speaker 3: was in the background, and I just remember anything that
Speaker 3: I went to, if it was national championships, would we
Speaker 3: had to pay. And my dad never really had a job,
Speaker 3: so we're on a single parent threshold and income, so
Speaker 3: we had to obviously go to a lot of Aboriginal
Speaker 3: funding or sports places and just asked to help for
Speaker 3: like money trying to do that, and it was never
Speaker 3: burdened late It's never was. I never knew that it
Speaker 3: was like hard for them to raise that, and I
Speaker 3: just I went to everything they made sure that it
Speaker 3: happened that I got to be involved with everything that
Speaker 3: I could and as possible that was there. So I
Speaker 3: think that was kind of my mum and dad really
Speaker 3: realized it, but never said it to me directly.
Speaker 2: When did you realize it? When you go wow, you know, listen,
Speaker 2: I'm good.
Speaker 3: You know it was Actually I told this story when
Speaker 3: I had my retirement game to the girls and our
Speaker 3: current goalkeeper coach. He was actually my very first goalkeeper
Speaker 3: coach at a camp and it was it was in
Speaker 3: two thousand and five, so my dad just passed away
Speaker 3: and I went to this camp and it was a
Speaker 3: selection camp before the team went to the Under twenties
Speaker 3: World Cup in Thailand for the girls, and I was
Speaker 3: a baby and there were three other goalkeepers who obviously
Speaker 3: were going to go and play, but he pulled me
Speaker 3: aside and he was like, don't quit, I'll see you
Speaker 3: in like a couple of years. And I was like, oh, yeah, whatever, yeah,
Speaker 3: And then literally like I was, I wasn't devastated because
Speaker 3: I was like, I've only gone to one camp. This
Speaker 3: is cool, Like I got to fly all the way
Speaker 3: to Perth and then three months later I got called
Speaker 3: into the national team at sixteen for my very first.
Speaker 2: Hand seen you get called into the national team. What
Speaker 2: did it take me back to that? What did that
Speaker 2: to take you back to that call? How did that happen?
Speaker 2: They contact your parents, They tell you where were you
Speaker 2: when you got that?
Speaker 3: They contacted my parents because at that time, I was
Speaker 3: actually training with the as boys, and the goalkeeper coach
Speaker 3: for the Matilda's kept coming into training camps at the AIS,
Speaker 3: and the coach at the time, Tom Somani, he kept
Speaker 3: seeing my progression of like improvement and I'm training with boys,
Speaker 3: I'm not training with girls anymore. And then he actually
Speaker 3: called that coach and the goalkeeper coach and myself and
Speaker 3: had a conversation with my parents and then they're like, okay,
Speaker 3: you're going to like Matilda's camp. And I'm like, who's
Speaker 3: Matilda's those girl the women that walked past, Like I'm
Speaker 3: still in school, Like what like okay, So yeah, that
Speaker 3: was my first kind of like introduction is like I
Speaker 3: was a schoolgirl.
Speaker 2: Was your father still alive?
Speaker 3: No? My dad wasn't alive at that point, So I
Speaker 3: kind of throughout that.
Speaker 2: I feel about that.
Speaker 3: It's hard, but I think through the difficulty in his
Speaker 3: diagnosis to when he passed, Like I me and Mum.
Speaker 3: It took us three years before we could both sit
Speaker 3: down and talk to each other, like it was impossible
Speaker 3: for us but your dad, yeah, because we were so
Speaker 3: upset and afraid that we'd make each other cry. But
Speaker 3: I mean we'd walk in to shopping centers together and
Speaker 3: like Mum would just start balling, and I was like,
Speaker 3: I don't even know how to help. I'm a fifteen
Speaker 3: year old going through angst myself and I find it
Speaker 3: really hard to open up. And I got sent to therapists,
Speaker 3: but I'm like, I don't want to talk, like I'm
Speaker 3: not I don't know what to talk about. And so
Speaker 3: for a good six months, like I can't remember anything.
Speaker 2: It's a blur.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a blur. But I think in that I
Speaker 3: took a lot of that pain and hurt and unease
Speaker 3: and turned it into.
Speaker 2: Sport, focused it on.
Speaker 3: I love that, Yeah, And it just went from there
Speaker 3: like it's I you know, it was something that I
Speaker 3: could do. I could go wake up every training day
Speaker 3: and go and be like, Okay, I don't have to
Speaker 3: think about anything. Yeah, I'm just I enjoy this is
Speaker 3: something I really like. People are there for me, but
Speaker 3: ultimately I'm I'm an athlete and they're athletes, and we
Speaker 3: have a job that we need to do.
Speaker 2: Yeah, redirectioning those negative emotions onto a positive sort of
Speaker 2: purpose really works, doesn't it.
Speaker 3: Yep?
Speaker 2: If you can tunnel let and focus on that. So
Speaker 2: that's phenomenal. So how do you feel when your mom
Speaker 2: tells you.
Speaker 3: I'm intimidated because I firstly, I don't know what it entails.
Speaker 3: Like I've not seen I don't know what a camp is.
Speaker 3: I don't know where they go.
Speaker 2: I don't know you're being thrown in deep ag.
Speaker 3: Yeah, like I know a few of them from like
Speaker 3: the academy training centers, but I don't I don't know anything.
Speaker 3: I'm not. At that point in time, I was a goalkeeper.
Speaker 3: I didn't really understand like technique and structure, and you know,
Speaker 3: I just loved what I was doing. And I think
Speaker 3: going into an environment that I wasn't sure, I was like, Okay, well,
Speaker 3: I think I only knew one person.
Speaker 2: And was it intimidating because your first Nations woman? Was
Speaker 2: that was the part of that or was it just
Speaker 2: intimidating just because of the magnitude of it, or was
Speaker 2: it a bit of both.
Speaker 3: At that point in time, I think because I was
Speaker 3: still grieving about my dad and going through that process.
Speaker 3: I think I really, I guess compumentalize the indigenous part
Speaker 3: and really kind of didn't really want to talk about
Speaker 3: being First Nations because that meant that I had to
Speaker 3: open up about my dad, and for me, I wasn't
Speaker 3: ready to do that. So I went in nervous as
Speaker 3: a sixteen year old, and I'm now in an environment
Speaker 3: with twenty five year olds, and I'm also someone who's
Speaker 3: quite shy at that time and quite you know, still
Speaker 3: trying to figure out everything that's going on. Of course,
Speaker 3: So yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Age you asking these questions, aren't you about yourself, about
Speaker 2: the situation about other people? It's like, yeah, you've you're
Speaker 2: trying to figure it all out, and you think at
Speaker 2: that age you can you can figure it all out,
Speaker 2: and ultimately you can't. It's yeah, it's a funny age
Speaker 2: to be out. I remember being at sixteen seventeen when
Speaker 2: I joined the military, and I'm just like so overwhelming.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, you just have to just take it each
Speaker 2: day as it comes. But how does your life change
Speaker 2: from that moment onwards? You know, what's your what was
Speaker 2: there an obvious change.
Speaker 3: No, like because I guess my life was still the same.
Speaker 3: I'd be able to leave school and go to training
Speaker 3: camps or tours that we did, but you know, I
Speaker 3: mean I was still like at school hanging with my friends.
Speaker 3: I'd miss you know, some weddings or birthdays or whatever
Speaker 3: it was, and that would suck. But I was like, no,
Speaker 3: it's like cool, I'll see you guys soon. And I'm
Speaker 3: traveling and I think at that point we only flew
Speaker 3: to like Asia, so it wasn't any huge flights away
Speaker 3: and it was maybe like four times a year, so
Speaker 3: really it was like, oh cool, Like I get a
Speaker 3: little holiday and a break and get a little bit
Speaker 3: of money.
Speaker 2: And while you're doing that, you're obviously playing for local team.
Speaker 3: Yep, yeah, who I was playing. It was like a
Speaker 3: state team, so it was like, yeah, Canberra Eclipse I
Speaker 3: think it was called back then. So yeah, and it
Speaker 3: wasn't like full time like it was. I train mostly.
Speaker 3: I think like I play on weekends and then just
Speaker 3: train separately and then just be able to play with
Speaker 3: like a club team.
Speaker 2: Back then, and I say back then, women's football it
Speaker 2: wasn't taking that seriously as it is now it's obviously
Speaker 2: you know, blown now, especially since the World Cup right
Speaker 2: last year. But what was it like did you feel
Speaker 2: like that that was it taken seriously or.
Speaker 3: Was it you know, I think it was it was
Speaker 3: because it was Everyone that was a part of it
Speaker 3: did it because they had passion. Because there wasn't money
Speaker 3: in it. There wasn't all these extras and sponsors. Everyone
Speaker 3: that was a part of it, from coaches to medical team,
Speaker 3: to gear people to the girls did it because it
Speaker 3: was like a passion that they had and they just
Speaker 3: loved it. So it was almost that rawness of like
Speaker 3: we're just going to go out and have fun. We
Speaker 3: have something to prove, but like, what are we like,
Speaker 3: Let's just go out and make sure that we make
Speaker 3: ourselves really proud and happy, not the expectations of everyone else.
Speaker 2: And when did it really start to ramp up for you?
Speaker 2: You know when because obviously the more the exposure it gets,
Speaker 2: the more you play that, you know, when did it
Speaker 2: start to really ramp up where this is full time now,
Speaker 2: this is you know, I'm in it.
Speaker 3: It was my first club that I went to, which
Speaker 3: was in the US. I went to Chicago and I
Speaker 3: was a nineteen year old kid going overseas for the
Speaker 3: first time.
Speaker 2: How does that come about?
Speaker 3: One of the girls was going there and they needed
Speaker 3: another goalkeeper. And at that point I was playing youth
Speaker 3: and was doing really well in the I call it
Speaker 3: Young Matilda's and I was already established in the Matildas
Speaker 3: now and it was an opportunity to go overseas. It
Speaker 3: was the first time that they had it. I have
Speaker 3: a dual citizenship, so, I mean, America uses a draft
Speaker 3: system where they do get a lot of college girls
Speaker 3: to join teams to then develop them. So it was
Speaker 3: basically I was a draft draft that had international experience
Speaker 3: and was playing and training at a really high level,
Speaker 3: Like why wouldn't you come get me? And you don't
Speaker 3: have to worry about visas or anything like that. So
Speaker 3: it was actually funny. The coach was m Hayes, so
Speaker 3: she was my first, my first like proper professional coach
Speaker 3: and now won a gold medal with the US so
Speaker 3: but yeah, she recruited me over and brought me over
Speaker 3: to the States, and that's when I was like, wow,
Speaker 3: Like we're training twice a day, We're doing this, We're
Speaker 3: drinking protein shakes, your nutritio. Yeah, yeah, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 3: we get to stay. You're paying for my apartment, like,
Speaker 3: and you're giving me a car to drive around and
Speaker 3: a salary. And and then I came home and I
Speaker 3: remember feeling like I was on top of the world.
Speaker 3: I don't play I played like maybe a few practice games,
Speaker 3: but I mean I was on a great team where
Speaker 3: I learned so much. And I came home and I
Speaker 3: thought like I was pretty pleasing with myself. Made it
Speaker 3: And initially I reckon yeah, and he lived on the
Speaker 3: back of the year and got told that I was
Speaker 3: basically nothing from some yeah not just needed to get
Speaker 3: rid of my arrogant attitude from some coaches that.
Speaker 2: The coaches, Wow, so did you get there? You get
Speaker 2: you're a bit of cocky, you're getting a bit complacent. Yeah,
Speaker 2: I've got everything at myfe because you've almost done the reverse.
Speaker 2: Normally people join a professional club and then they go
Speaker 2: onto the national team. You were in the national team.
Speaker 2: That's why I said. You went straight to the the
Speaker 2: national team, and you've done the flip reverse right from
Speaker 2: the national team and then you went and played played professionals.
Speaker 2: So you get a clip around the ear in America?
Speaker 2: How does that how does that feel?
Speaker 3: No, I mean that was a bit rough. That was
Speaker 3: it was a it's what I needed. But at the
Speaker 3: time I was like I didn't do anything, Like why
Speaker 3: am I getting like almost like punished, like here I am,
Speaker 3: But no, it was it was needed. I think it
Speaker 3: gave me a little bit of down to earth of like,
Speaker 3: look how good that person is and why aren't you playing? Like,
Speaker 3: well you're not playing, so whatever your arrogance is, like
Speaker 3: I don't know where it comes from, because guess what,
Speaker 3: you're not actually on the pitch. And it was like, oh, yeah, okay,
Speaker 3: well what are they doing that I need to do?
Speaker 3: And I think that was awake. It was a quick
Speaker 3: wake up call. I think it was six months of cockiness. Yeah,
Speaker 3: and then it was like nope.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I remember when I joined the military and I
Speaker 2: passed out training best your cruit, best PT and then
Speaker 2: we go into my first unit and the same with
Speaker 2: me the first year, just like I don't need to
Speaker 2: do anything. And then the rude awakening of it seeing
Speaker 2: people overtake you, seeing people getting promoted in front of you.
Speaker 2: See it's just like wow, I need I actually need
Speaker 2: this wake up cool. Yeah, because again, like you say
Speaker 2: I'm not on the pitch, they are what do I
Speaker 2: need to do to get there? And what did you
Speaker 2: do to get there? Oh?
Speaker 3: Well, then I came back and I was didn't go
Speaker 3: back overseas. I actually was looking for another opportunity, which
Speaker 3: it came in the form I had a year to
Speaker 3: be at home, and during that time we had I
Speaker 3: actually broke my wrist during that time.
Speaker 2: Oh wow.
Speaker 3: When I came back home, I was just training with
Speaker 3: the boys. It was a bit of a wet night
Speaker 3: and I went out to save a ball and when
Speaker 3: I saved it, it just felt something in my wrist
Speaker 3: kind of snap. So I actually then for the next
Speaker 3: eight months there was qualifiers with the national team and
Speaker 3: qualifiers with the youth national team, and so I had
Speaker 3: to put a splint on and then I was waiting
Speaker 3: until I could get surgery. So I played for eight
Speaker 3: months with a broken wrist. Just strapped it up, just
Speaker 3: strapped it up, sucked it up.
Speaker 2: You don't what I mean. Those opportunities, right, and just
Speaker 2: like don't know that you had a broken risk. Yeah,
Speaker 2: they wasn't something that you heard because you wanted to
Speaker 2: do your trials.
Speaker 3: It was just yeah, it was they were just like,
Speaker 3: what can we do? So I went to a risk specialist.
Speaker 3: They gave me a little splint to wear and I
Speaker 3: just wore it under my glove and just got on
Speaker 3: with it until I had time to actually have surgery,
Speaker 3: which was in twenty ten, so I had I think
Speaker 3: it was four months off doing rehab, got back into it,
Speaker 3: and then two thousand and eleven I went over to
Speaker 3: Sweden for my next club, and I was a two
Speaker 3: year deal and when I got over there, I had
Speaker 3: a great two months. And then the second game of
Speaker 3: the season, I ran out for a ball and tore
Speaker 3: my ACL.
Speaker 2: That's that's a pretty serious injury. Yeah, Carl, what was
Speaker 2: going for your head when you're on the ground? Yeah?
Speaker 2: Do you know it? Do you know? Do you know
Speaker 2: exactly what it was? No?
Speaker 3: I thought it was my hamstring at first, but then
Speaker 3: I got up and tried to move and my knee
Speaker 3: gave out, and I was like, what is that feeling?
Speaker 3: I hate that feeling.
Speaker 2: And you'd only just gone to Sweden.
Speaker 3: Yeah, only just gone to Sweden. And in my head
Speaker 3: I was like, I'm the furthest away that I could
Speaker 3: be from Australia. Literally, the furthest part of Sweden Airport
Speaker 3: I was, so it was to travel there. It was
Speaker 3: at least thirty hours. In my head, I'm like, oh
Speaker 3: my god, I ain't gonna have I need to get surgery.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, am I covered for surgery? Like is
Speaker 3: that the club covers that? Or do I need to
Speaker 3: go home? And they weren't actually sure of the diagnosis either,
Speaker 3: So then I had to be there and wait. And
Speaker 3: it was at a time in Australia when quite a
Speaker 3: few of the team started getting a cls, so it
Speaker 3: was maybe three girls on the national team had acls
Speaker 3: within that six months as well, so I kind of
Speaker 3: knew from talking to them when they had theirs done,
Speaker 3: like what it feels like, where were they? Did they
Speaker 3: come home? Whatever it was, And so in my head
Speaker 3: I was panicking because I was like, oh no, I'm
Speaker 3: like them feeling I'm seeing so many similarities and hearing
Speaker 3: so many things that like I need to get home.
Speaker 3: So that was a real hard time of I didn't
Speaker 3: really want to hurt my relationship with the club because
Speaker 3: I was only there for two months, and then I
Speaker 3: was like, but also I need.
Speaker 2: To sort this out. Yeah, I need to get get
Speaker 2: it done, and also being somewhere where you feel like
Speaker 2: it's home, you know, especially with an injury, you know,
Speaker 2: you don't want to be somewhere where you're not familiar with,
Speaker 2: you know, especially if you were covering, and so you
Speaker 2: fly back to.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so I ended up being I fly back to
Speaker 3: Australia to get surgery and I was there for three
Speaker 3: months to make sure that kind of the hard stuff
Speaker 3: was out of the way with a physio at home
Speaker 3: and I could be home. And I remember just being
Speaker 3: so like emotional and just I mean I wanted to go.
Speaker 3: I was loving it. I was loving being away from home,
Speaker 3: and I remember I had to be back home with
Speaker 3: my mom whilst nursing an injury, and it was just,
Speaker 3: I think, really hard for us both. That was the
Speaker 3: first time we actually spent time together since I left.
Speaker 2: And how did that affect your relationship with the Matilda's.
Speaker 3: That was fine because at that time we didn't have contracts,
Speaker 3: so and also the kind of like the talent pool
Speaker 3: that was coming in there was not much because the
Speaker 3: competition in Australia was only three months long, So really,
Speaker 3: where are you finding people they need to be in
Speaker 3: academies and state institutes to kind of get that, but
Speaker 3: there was no real kind of stepping stone to keep
Speaker 3: developing that turnover and that threshold. So yeah, I was
Speaker 3: fine for the matildas. That was all good. It was
Speaker 3: just kind of like get healthy, get fit again, and
Speaker 3: then I went back over and finished my Yeah, finish
Speaker 3: my rehab there. Next season was fine, and then the
Speaker 3: following season I went over to America again, and halfway
Speaker 3: through that season I redid the same ACL give me yeah,
Speaker 3: and that was right. I was in twenty fourteen, and
Speaker 3: that was ten and a half months out before the
Speaker 3: World Cup in twenty fifteen.
Speaker 2: And how did that affect your mindset?
Speaker 3: I remember telling the physio I've done it, and we
Speaker 3: walked right in. He goes, I'm not gonna test you
Speaker 3: here because it's going to be on TV and we're
Speaker 3: going to walk in and I'm going to test you,
Speaker 3: so I need you to get up and let's go.
Speaker 3: So up, I get walk with him in. He tests
Speaker 3: and he's like, yeah, we can get an MRI, but like,
Speaker 3: we'll get one, but we'll try and get you home.
Speaker 3: And I remember getting my phone and walking back out
Speaker 3: to the bench and calling my national team doctor and
Speaker 3: national team coach at the time, and going, I've done it.
Speaker 3: What do I need to do to get back for
Speaker 3: the World Cup? And at that time, I was the
Speaker 3: starting goalkeeper, so it was all hands on deck. They said,
Speaker 3: we'll book you a flight and we'll get you into
Speaker 3: surgery in a week, So I had two days to
Speaker 3: pack everything up. Oh. Actually, I was devastated that night,
Speaker 3: and I remember I was talking to Abby one back
Speaker 3: actually and most epic US footballer goalscorer, and she told me,
Speaker 3: let's have a drink tonight. You can cry about it,
Speaker 3: you can be sad, but when you wake up tomorrow,
Speaker 3: you're going to the World Cup. And I remember that
Speaker 3: the words that got me through that whole rehab. And
Speaker 3: I didn't have time to think in that time that rehab,
Speaker 3: I had zero time to think. I had physio. Yeah,
Speaker 3: I had no time to even doubt anything. And during
Speaker 3: that time, it would be like wake up, go to
Speaker 3: the gym, You're doing mobility circuit and a workout, and
Speaker 3: then after that we're going to go outside and do
Speaker 3: running or whatever, or go on the recovery center. So
Speaker 3: that takes me to lunchtime, go get lunch, drive back
Speaker 3: home and then you're going to do a goalkeeping session
Speaker 3: where it's just just catching, just whatever it is to
Speaker 3: keep the mind ticking over. Then you're going to watch
Speaker 3: some footage of you playing, and then it's study bedtime,
Speaker 3: and then you're doing that for a whole nine months.
Speaker 3: And then at that time, we were actually going into
Speaker 3: camp from about five months out of the of the
Speaker 3: World Cup, like literally five days in weekends off, five
Speaker 3: days in weekends off, and they wanted me in and
Speaker 3: to continue that process. But now I'm around the team. Wow,
Speaker 3: And it was the way that everyone banded together during
Speaker 3: that moment really makes me grateful that that would have
Speaker 3: been a make or break for me in I think
Speaker 3: in my career of mentally and physically and injury wise.
Speaker 3: But the way that they kind of banded together for that, yeah,
Speaker 3: it really got me through. I think what could have
Speaker 3: been something awful.
Speaker 2: So yes, teamwork that ultimately got you got you your
Speaker 2: mindset straight to think, right, we're gonna have a drink
Speaker 2: after this, We're going to prepare for the World Cup.
Speaker 2: How did that preparation go and when? How what was
Speaker 2: it like getting the called up or you know, did
Speaker 2: departing for your first World Cup wasn't it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was that I got through the rehab fine.
Speaker 3: I got to eight and a half months, which they
Speaker 3: kind of like they're like nine months earliest, very earliest.
Speaker 3: And I got to eight and a half months, and
Speaker 3: coach said to me, in order for you to play
Speaker 3: your first game in these next like four weeks, I
Speaker 3: need you to play ten games for me to feel
Speaker 3: confident that I can play, ready, that you are ready
Speaker 3: to go.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And so that basically was go to camp, play midweek,
Speaker 3: go home play on the weekend. Go to camp play midweek,
Speaker 3: go home play on the weekend. And I had to
Speaker 3: do that. And that was the one part that I
Speaker 3: was if I doubted anything, that would have been the
Speaker 3: only part, just because I was like, this is my
Speaker 3: first games back. I don't know what's going to happen.
Speaker 3: I'm playing at home with a boys team, like I
Speaker 3: had to find a team.
Speaker 2: Yeah, of course. Yeah.
Speaker 3: And so I was playing with boys teams and then
Speaker 3: the week day I'd be playing with the girls at camp.
Speaker 3: So that was hectic. And then getting that phone call,
Speaker 3: like it was face to face just saying Okay, you're going,
Speaker 3: we got you. Wow, you're going. It's fine.
Speaker 2: All that hard work. Yeah, that dedication and commitment. How
Speaker 2: did that feel when you when you were sitting face
Speaker 2: to face and you've got that cool up let's call it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's just validation, just validation that I had people
Speaker 3: had my back and people believed in me and at
Speaker 3: that tournament. Different now, but that was what year was
Speaker 3: at twenty fifteen. Fifteen, we actually made history back becoming
Speaker 3: the first Australian nation to make it past knockout rounds.
Speaker 3: So we beat Brazil in the knockout rounds and then
Speaker 3: we're facing Japan who ultimately won that World Cup. But
Speaker 3: that was the first time men or women we made
Speaker 3: history of getting through that.
Speaker 2: How would you describe teamwork, you know, coming from such
Speaker 2: an elite sort of high performance team, what would you
Speaker 2: say that teamwork is?
Speaker 3: The teamwork is just like you have to make sure
Speaker 3: that what yourself you are selfish with what your job is,
Speaker 3: but the ultimate goal is what the team's job is.
Speaker 3: And if you don't have a peripheral then it just
Speaker 3: doesn't work. If you're just purely focused on yourself, then great,
Speaker 3: you did, you did your job, but guess what we lost,
Speaker 3: So it doesn't matter. So I think, yeah, teamwork is
Speaker 3: like selfishly peripheral vision.
Speaker 2: Do you thrive in a team? You know, how good
Speaker 2: is it? How good does it feel to be of
Speaker 2: a part of a high performance team where they get it?
Speaker 2: You know, when people just just get it, They're not
Speaker 2: just there for the sake of it, going in doing
Speaker 2: what they need to do and buggering off that. You know,
Speaker 2: it's the whole atmosphere, the whole sort of coming together,
Speaker 2: the bonding of a of a proper high performance team.
Speaker 3: It just it just feels like things click, Like you
Speaker 3: don't you don't feel like you have to wake up
Speaker 3: and be like, oh, here we go again, Like you're
Speaker 3: like it's a hard day, I'm going to get through it,
Speaker 3: and then I get a rest or whatever it is.
Speaker 3: And I remember an old coach of mine one of
Speaker 3: the best things he's ever said. He's coached men and women,
Speaker 3: and his observation was for men, for them to like perform,
Speaker 3: they need to perform to belong. But for women they
Speaker 3: need for them to thrive is they need to belong
Speaker 3: to then perform. And that was the one thing that
Speaker 3: through his object you could just kind of you kind
Speaker 3: of see how it works, like yeah, like I was
Speaker 3: like no, like, let's fit in, let's form this trust
Speaker 3: and whatever it is, and now we're all performing. Or
Speaker 3: I can tell you now you need to do better
Speaker 3: and you don't find that threatening or intimidating where minutes
Speaker 3: you know you have to do it. If you don't,
Speaker 3: well we can bugger off.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So you did the twenty fifteen World Cup,
Speaker 2: how did you perform?
Speaker 3: Good? That's that was a defining moment. I think for
Speaker 3: me just within myself getting through what I did and
Speaker 3: then us achieving what we did as a team. I
Speaker 3: just felt an overwhelming sense of strength, I think, both
Speaker 3: on the pitch, off the pitch.
Speaker 2: Just carry it throughout your whole demeanor.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because after that, we had our CBA negotiations enduring
Speaker 3: the Collective Bargaining Agreement. So seven years, four years prior
Speaker 3: was the first time that we had contracts and now
Speaker 3: we were it was up. It goes for four year cycles.
Speaker 3: Now it was up during the World Cup and we
Speaker 3: were getting ready to renegotiate and they halted the renegotiate
Speaker 3: the renegotiations and basically we were on twenty thousand for
Speaker 3: that whole work with national team for what we're putting
Speaker 3: in like we were nine to five. Basically we were
Speaker 3: on not a lot of money, we were below minimum wage. Wow,
Speaker 3: we were like and it just was stopped, like there
Speaker 3: was no movement in your country represent and we just
Speaker 3: did the most amazing thing and there was nothing, nothing happening.
Speaker 3: And I remember out of that, we were scheduled to
Speaker 3: play the US, we were world champions, and we said no,
Speaker 3: we had a strike. It was when do we get
Speaker 3: a change here? Like do you want to invest in us?
Speaker 3: Because we really believe in ourselves. And that was definitely
Speaker 3: a team effort of everyone being like, no, collectively, we're
Speaker 3: gonna say no. And there was so many phone calls,
Speaker 3: there were so many conversations that we had just to
Speaker 3: make sure everyone was either on the same page or
Speaker 3: just understood the stance on majority. And yeah, we had
Speaker 3: we had to strike and you know, got basically what
Speaker 3: we wanted, which was improvement. And then you know, four
Speaker 3: years after that, we're equal parody with the men. So yeah,
Speaker 3: that twenty fifteen.
Speaker 2: Stand was a pivotable turning point, right wow. And then
Speaker 2: so for the next World Cup, which is obviously four years,
Speaker 2: it's four years and World Cups you want the same
Speaker 2: pay as men. Yeah, that's a huge moldstone car. How
Speaker 2: did that feel? Oh?
Speaker 3: I just felt like we got now belief in our federation.
Speaker 3: Like before it was like we had belief in ourselves
Speaker 3: and then now all of a sudden, it's like more
Speaker 3: people come on for the right and.
Speaker 2: And you feel valued, right, Yeah, you know you're putting
Speaker 2: the hours in. You know you want to feel valued,
Speaker 2: and it's just yeah, that feel good. That feel good feeding,
Speaker 2: isn't it.
Speaker 3: Yeah? And also like the hard yards that a lot
Speaker 3: of us did, it was like validation for that, but
Speaker 3: it was also a stance on like if you want
Speaker 3: to now be in the national team, you've got to
Speaker 3: understand like this is where we're at. If you want
Speaker 3: that money, you need to perform or if you want
Speaker 3: to be up here with the big dogs, like you've
Speaker 3: got to make sure that we continue performing and we
Speaker 3: continue fighting. So yeah, I think through that trying to
Speaker 3: see as like the money or is the reward for
Speaker 3: you to work hard? It's not you working hard, like
Speaker 3: you get that money to work hard, it's you will
Speaker 3: get that if you work hard.
Speaker 2: And when did the first major come knocking on your door?
Speaker 2: Because you played for some c I was just looking
Speaker 2: through and I'm like, wow, phg as, I'm an Arsenal
Speaker 2: fanily So when was your first major club? When did
Speaker 2: they come knocking?
Speaker 3: It was actually during COVID so Joe Montemoruro it was
Speaker 3: the coach and he went over there and I had
Speaker 3: him at Melbourne City and he just kind of was saying, look,
Speaker 3: we have an opening spot for a goalkeeper. Do you
Speaker 3: want to come over? And I was like, I loved
Speaker 3: working with him, and it was just at a point
Speaker 3: in my career where I knew that I probably couldn't
Speaker 3: do like full seasons or probably needed to be at
Speaker 3: a place where I was cared for physically, because I
Speaker 3: could kind of feel my body starts shifting into a
Speaker 3: point of like your reach and the end of that hill.
Speaker 3: You're at the top of that and let's see what's yeah, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 3: So I was like, you know, so for me, I
Speaker 3: was like, yeah, you know what, that actually sounds pretty good.
Speaker 3: So flew over to London and got to be a
Speaker 3: London colony and you know, play with the girls and
Speaker 3: experience what life was like at Arsenal, which yes, it's
Speaker 3: just a different world. England is a different world with
Speaker 3: football they live.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and how was that culture change?
Speaker 3: It was good, Like I really enjoyed it. It was
Speaker 3: definitely different because it still was COVID and everything that
Speaker 3: was happening in between of COVID was you know, crazy,
Speaker 3: but it was, Yeah, it was. It was a great time.
Speaker 3: Like I mean, the world stopped. Football didn't stop, sport
Speaker 3: didn't stop, and so to be a part of you know,
Speaker 3: making sure that you know, we still had income, we
Speaker 3: still were doing our job was really nice. And being
Speaker 3: at a place like Arsenal to provide that to the players,
Speaker 3: it just felt like the lifeline of you know what
Speaker 3: basically stopped the world?
Speaker 2: How cool is that Arsenal football player? Man, did you
Speaker 2: have a did it ever sink in to realize the
Speaker 2: magnitude of who you're playing for? And because I know
Speaker 2: you say, the UK it has it's a different beast
Speaker 2: when it comes to football. But to say that you played,
Speaker 2: you know, you're an Arsenal player, that's that's that's a
Speaker 2: pinch yourself moment. Yeah.
Speaker 3: I think when we when I started really watching EPL,
Speaker 3: like I've always watched it, but just it was just
Speaker 3: you know, it's on all the time, like Sky sports
Speaker 3: BB see, like it's just on all the time, and
Speaker 3: I'm like really immersed myself within that culture and went
Speaker 3: to like a few of the men's games and I
Speaker 3: was like, heck, yeah, this is cool, Like this is
Speaker 3: so interesting and so different to what I haven't been
Speaker 3: exposed to before.
Speaker 2: Wow. So you go from Arsenal then to PHG, Yeah,
Speaker 2: now they're the Giants. Yeah right now, how did you
Speaker 2: do you poach? How did that get come? Of course?
Speaker 3: So I was kind of in the middle of, I guess,
Speaker 3: figuring out what I wanted to do next, and then
Speaker 3: another again, another opportunity. It kind of feels like with me,
Speaker 3: opportunities that have come around have been within like a
Speaker 3: month of needing, needing to make an answer and a
Speaker 3: decision within that like everything that I planned out probably
Speaker 3: hasn't worked out, But anything that's been like you have
Speaker 3: two weeks are you going? Are you not? Has been
Speaker 3: Arsenal has been PSG has been Whatever's next? But yeah,
Speaker 3: it literally was I was trying to figure out what
Speaker 3: to do. I was still in England, like in the
Speaker 3: middle of like contract negotiations or you know, talking to
Speaker 3: other clubs, and then PSG came through to my agent
Speaker 3: and was like, we have an opening. Is it yes
Speaker 3: or no? We need to figure it out. And I
Speaker 3: was like, heck, yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Want to go.
Speaker 3: So yeah, up, I packed everything and off to France.
Speaker 2: I went, wow, are you starting to now pick up
Speaker 2: sponsorships and is you know, immersing yourself as this this
Speaker 2: professional footballer.
Speaker 3: I think it was more I knew that I didn't
Speaker 3: have that much time left, like how long is this
Speaker 3: fairytale gonna end? Or when does this this end? So
Speaker 3: I really kind of had to sit down and I
Speaker 3: think around, you know, during this time is when I
Speaker 3: started thinking about retirement, what that looks like, when does
Speaker 3: that happen? Where am I going to be? And for
Speaker 3: me it was I had kind of a year and
Speaker 3: a bit with Brighton, Oh sorry, with PHG and then
Speaker 3: I was like, you know what that's that's going to
Speaker 3: sound really good. And then we were leading into our
Speaker 3: World Cup preparation and everything and kind I had a
Speaker 3: three YEP and I had a conversation with my coaches
Speaker 3: with the national team and they were like, you know,
Speaker 3: you're not really playing that much at PSG, which training
Speaker 3: environment was awesome. I it basically didn't really need to
Speaker 3: to play all the time kind of I guess what
Speaker 3: was optics and what I needed to do in case
Speaker 3: I needed to play. I needed to be at a
Speaker 3: place where I had that opportunity. So I had to
Speaker 3: make a decision what I wanted to do, and I
Speaker 3: left PSG and went to Brighton, back to the UK.
Speaker 3: Back to the UK. I didn't say it too many
Speaker 3: bad places London and Brighton, so I was cheering. I
Speaker 3: went to the best places I could be.
Speaker 2: You certainly did.
Speaker 3: But yeah, that was at a point where I was
Speaker 3: starting to think about what's next. But at that time
Speaker 3: also it was you know, getting sponsors and leading into
Speaker 3: what the World Cup was, and it was like, you know,
Speaker 3: I'm going to try and put in as much as
Speaker 3: i can in my body and in my like I
Speaker 3: knew that it was my last tournament. Sure in twenty twenty,
Speaker 3: we had the opportunity for the bid, and when we
Speaker 3: got it, the bid, and we're like, oh, we're actually
Speaker 3: doing it. Like obviously the men tried to go for
Speaker 3: the bid and blew it out and didn't happen for
Speaker 3: the Men's World Cup, and so I was like, we
Speaker 3: actually have a good chance because two other teams bowed
Speaker 3: out and then it was us in Colombia and I
Speaker 3: was like, oh my god, we can actually win this thing.
Speaker 3: And then I remember sitting in this boardroom. We're all
Speaker 3: like social distancing in the chairs at three am. We've
Speaker 3: been campaigning and media calling like from seven pm. And
Speaker 3: I remember the President FIFA coming on and doing the
Speaker 3: announcement and obviously going the you know, the rights holders
Speaker 3: for the FIFA twenty twenty three Women's World Cup is
Speaker 3: Australia New Zealand, and we went berserk, I can imagine,
Speaker 3: But it was just because we've been to so many
Speaker 3: World Cups and all we want and it was Australia
Speaker 3: to feel what we felt and see what it's like
Speaker 3: in Europe in places where we've been, and really wrap
Speaker 3: up in that culture. And honestly, like I wouldn't have
Speaker 3: You couldn't have paid me enough money to Like, I
Speaker 3: would have not won anything if you would have told
Speaker 3: me that World Cup would have gone the way it has.
Speaker 3: And just the the vibe and support and people like
Speaker 3: falling in love with the team and enjoying football like
Speaker 3: it's just everything we dreamed of and kind of can't
Speaker 3: believe that it happened that World Cup.
Speaker 2: The viewing figures were the biggest of any sporting event
Speaker 2: in the history of Australia. That is huge. The turning
Speaker 2: point for that because all of a sudden you're on
Speaker 2: the global map. Now was it? Was it that obvious
Speaker 2: for us? It was because all of a sudden, we're
Speaker 2: seeing it. We're seeing the matildas everywhere, We're seeing Australia everywhere.
Speaker 2: You know, it's it's in your face? Was it obvious
Speaker 2: for you guys on the other end?
Speaker 3: I think it grew as the tournament went on. The
Speaker 3: first game against Ireland, when Steph took up to take
Speaker 3: the penalty, started obviously with Irish fans. I mean, you
Speaker 3: know how Irish fans are. They're cheering the whole game,
Speaker 3: and I think people in the stands are watching us,
Speaker 3: they're like, oh, like okay, they're cheering, like do we
Speaker 3: need to cheer back? And then all of a sudden
Speaker 3: they started to understand, you know, how it looks like
Speaker 3: and how it works, and you know, and then Steph
Speaker 3: scores and then this huge eruption. It was like, wow,
Speaker 3: that's cool. And then as it progressed, it got to
Speaker 3: you know, us versus Canada and I must win game
Speaker 3: in Melbourne and then obviously the bat Stadium people were
Speaker 3: just cheering the whole time and it was like this
Speaker 3: is a cool vibe. And then we won that game,
Speaker 3: and then it kind of like people started to understand
Speaker 3: what it's like and how like you could almost see
Speaker 3: like people starting to get more and more into it.
Speaker 3: And then by the time the the England game came up,
Speaker 3: and just hearing the crowd when Sam scored that goal,
Speaker 3: like it was deafening, and I think that was just
Speaker 3: like so life changing. Definitely the France game life changing.
Speaker 3: The France game was definitely I think when everyone was like,
Speaker 3: oh my god, like they believe in us, and then
Speaker 3: all of a sudden that when it got to that
Speaker 3: Sam scoring that goal, but then it was like can
Speaker 3: they win it?
Speaker 2: And then there was true belief in the campaign. And
Speaker 2: what was it like coming back as national heroes? It
Speaker 2: was phenomenal?
Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, I mean never like it's it's weird because
Speaker 3: we've all known each other since we were children. It
Speaker 3: was like teenagers, we've all grown up together, we've all
Speaker 3: known each other, so for us, it's like, oh yeah,
Speaker 3: like these guys are the same, like, you know, we're
Speaker 3: gonna catch up with each other when everyone's retired. We're
Speaker 3: gonna make sure there's time for our families to get together.
Speaker 3: And I think that's the beauty of the team is
Speaker 3: everyone already has this relationship with each other from the
Speaker 3: hardships and from the things that happened before the World Cup.
Speaker 3: That when after the World Cup and everyone's looking at us,
Speaker 3: we're like, oh, yeah, this is cool. But like we've
Speaker 3: always been like this, We've always you know, done this
Speaker 3: and worked hard. It's just now we have more eyes
Speaker 3: on us, and now we nearly meant it, We nearly
Speaker 3: made it. Like we're we actually really believed in ourselves
Speaker 3: and you guys believed in us.
Speaker 2: Well it's phenomenal, it's well deserved and it's about time.
Speaker 2: And a final question for you, Lydia, what is next
Speaker 2: for you? Where are you going? What you're doing? And yeah,
Speaker 2: where's where do you see yourself now?
Speaker 3: Well, I'm definitely home, permanently home now in Australia, which
Speaker 3: you feel good, Yeah, it does. I'm still trying to
Speaker 3: figure out how winter works, haven't We've done that for
Speaker 3: a while. But no, I'm home now, I'm doing a
Speaker 3: little bit of speaking and joining the speaker's circuit and
Speaker 3: all that kind of stuff. But I do want to
Speaker 3: give back as much as possible, whether that's First Nations
Speaker 3: or football or you know, just empowerment. So that's kind
Speaker 3: of my big passion empowerment.
Speaker 2: Wow, brilliant, Well listen. All the power to you, Lydia.
Speaker 2: It's been great talking to you. Thank you ever so much.
Speaker 2: Keep inspiring. It's been a pleasure.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Thank you.
Speaker 2: Lydia. Williams is the author of Goal and Saved Our
Speaker 2: linked the details in the show notes. Thank you so
Speaker 2: much for joining me on Headgame. If you enjoyed this episode,
Speaker 2: make sure you're subscribed so you don't miss any of
Speaker 2: our incredible stories and leave me a review wherever you're listening.
Speaker 2: I'm Att Middleton. Catch you again next time.