“Are you sure?” Alex Chidiac had to double check when she found out she was in the Matildas World Cup squad. The coach, Tony Gustavsson, had no reason to joke or lie, but Chidiac simply couldn’t process what she was hearing.
“I really had no clue how to handle it,” she said. “I just hadn’t really fully thought of that as an outcome because I think I was protecting myself from that news four years ago.”
Chidiac is one of seven World Cup debutants in Gustavsson’s 23-woman squad – all with fewer than 30 caps each for the national side. Clare Wheeler and Kyra Cooney-Cross join Chidiac in the midfield ranks, Courtney Vine adds pace to the attack, and Clare Hunt, Charlotte Grant and Courtney Nevin bring some much needed depth to what has been an injury-depleted backline.
Preparations continue on Friday against France in a final warm-up game at Marvel Stadium and, after missing out on the squad for the 2019 World Cup, selection this time around is the realisation of a lifelong dream for midfielder Chidiac.
“I think now being in Melbourne and preparing for that game against France, it’s all going to start to kick in,” Chidiac said. “I can actually dive deep fully into that and I can just play with freedom.”
Chidiac admits she struggled to understand her place in the Matildas line-up at first – she has often been deployed off the bench to stir things up in the second half. But with her spot confirmed, she’s leaning into the “super-sub” role. “I’ve been able to see for myself the impact that I can make in 20 minutes with this team. I think I can now hone in on that for the World Cup.”
Hunt, the most recent arrival into the mix, slotted in so naturally next to Clare Polkinghorne against Denmark in February that Gustavsson said he had not seen another debut like it. It is a feeling shared by her teammates. Vice-captain Steph Catley says Hunt’s arrival was a “real turning point” for the team which in the past had to shuffle players into unfamiliar positions when Polkinghorne or Alanna Kennedy were injured.
“I looked at her and I was like, ‘she’s ready, she’s good,’” Catley said. “She’s proved that since the minute she stepped on the field. And I think this is where people shine. Major tournaments show you what you’ve really got and what you’re about, and I think she’ll step up to that.”
For her part, Hunt doesn’t bear the nerves of someone who has played just five international games, nor the potential ego of a bolter talked up like she has been at such an early stage in her career. Hunt exudes a calm befitting her steadying role at centre-back, reminiscent of Polkinghorne.
“It’s reassuring to hear that,” she says of the praise. “I felt trusted that I could go out there for 45 minutes and do the job. I had worked so hard for that opportunity that I’m like, ‘you are going to do nothing except do the job’. It’s amazing what you can do when you strip things back to the bare minimum.”
After a horror run with injuries over the last five years – seven surgeries, most requiring long-term rehabilitation – Hunt “never felt like I could express myself as a footballer, I was more known for how well I rehabbed”. But with a full season at Western Sydney Wanderers behind her, and her name on the World Cup roster, Hunt finally feels like the patience and work have paid off. “Now on the seventh [injury], I’ve reaped every reward I could ever possibly think of and I would never not do what I did. An experience like this … makes that last five years feel like it was worth it.”
The only other full-time A-League Women player in the squad is Vine, who is fresh off a third-straight premiership and a fourth championship with Sydney FC. The winger says being named in her first World Cup squad alongside Chidiac and other players she has grown up with is a “full circle moment”.
“We used to speak about it in under-20s,” Vine says. “We obviously didn’t know there’s going to be a World Cup on home soil at that point, but we’ve always wanted to be part of the Matildas. There are some of my best mates who got cut and that was devastating. But to have some of them still here, it’s going to make it the best.”
The debutants are trying not to succumb to the weight of expectation a home World Cup carries, but rather take it in their stride. “To be able to play a part in history here in Australia is just a unique thing that I get to do now,” Chidiac says. “I think the impact that it’s going to have and the legacy it’s going to leave is going to speak for itself afterwards.”
