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House of Assembly - Fifty-Fifth Parliament, First Session (55-1)
2023-03-22 Daily Xml
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Socceroos

Mr TARZIA (Hartley) (12:41): I move:

That this house—

(a) congratulates the Socceroos on their World Cup achievements;

(b) notes the former state Liberal government's commitment to investing in soccer facilities for South Australians, including the over $50 million Hindmarsh Stadium upgrade; and

(c) calls upon the Malinauskas government to continue to uphold the standard set by the former government and commit to supporting and funding South Australian soccer institutions.

We have witnessed history here in Australia as we saw the tremendous result, the tremendous Socceroo performance that we witnessed at the FIFA World Cup. We should talk a little bit about the various games that we witnessed. On 22 November 2022, unfortunately, Australia did go down to France. I remember watching that game and how good it was to see South Australia's own Craig Goodwin actually star and kick a goal—kick a goal against the absolute football powerhouse that is France with players like Mbappé and various others. It was an absolute powerhouse of a football team that we played against, but we saw people from South Australia take the fight up to the very best in the world, and we should be extremely proud of that result.

The next game was on 26 November 2022, when we won—one-nil against Tunisia. It was held at Al Janoub Stadium with an attendance of over 41,000 people. What an absolutely tremendous result, with us scoring in the 23rd minute. The next game was on 30 November, when we kicked a goal against Denmark, and won one-nil. It was an absolutely amazing result against, again, a very strong football nation in Denmark.

Then we come to the next one, Argentina. I declare that I am an Argentinian football fan and I have Argentinian merchandise at home. The main reason is that when I was growing up I thought that Maradona was from Naples and not from Argentina, but when I got a little bit older I realised that he was from Argentina and not Naples. Of course, he is much revered; he has much love from that part of the world.

Argentina: wow. They had an early stumbling block, you could say; I think it was against Saudi Arabia. I would have to check that, but I think they lost an early game. But the way that they rebounded was absolutely tremendous. This was a team that, going into the cup, was basically undefeated for something like over 20 games at one stage.

Look at the sorts of players the Australians had to play against: Messi and Alvarez, who are literally the best in the world, some say amongst the best to have ever played the game. For us to have performed extremely well, we can really hold our heads high—going down only 1-2 to Argentina, the team that would of course ultimately take out the World Cup. What does this say about our football (soccer) in Australia and the way that it has come?

It is particularly fantastic to see players like Craig Goodwin—following their stories and seeing their resilience. We should be really proud as South Australians and as Australians. I think it is incumbent upon us to do everything we can to make sure that we continue to invest in boys' and girls' sport, in men's and women's sport, because there is certainly enormous state pride and country pride that comes from performing so well. Of course, you also have the recreational benefits, the preventative health benefits, that link to this.

The Socceroos have made Australia proud as a result of their outstanding performance at the 2022 FIFA World Cup. I mentioned those victories against Tunisia and Denmark. Australians proudly welcomed the Socceroos home after what was a spectacular showing at the FIFA World Cup in Qatar.

During the World Cup the Socceroos actually made history for Australia many times over, beginning with, as I said, a qualifying victory against Peru, which was a dramatic penalty shootout. They went on to win against Tunisia; that was the first clean sheet in many years in a World Cup. They carried that score through to yet another historic win against the football powerhouse that is Denmark, a tremendous result. Do not forget that Denmark were actually ranked in the FIFA World Cup top 10 at the time, so do not underestimate that feat. It is an absolutely extraordinary feat.

After qualifying for that round of 16 and finally facing off against the true Titans of football that are Argentina, just the fact that we are in the same conversation—that the Socceroos are in the same conversation, all of a sudden, as Argentina—shows how far we have come in Australia. I am excited for the future of football in Australia. After qualifying, as I said, we only went down to Argentina with a loss of 1-2, but it was a spectacular performance. It was played in tremendous spirit. As I said, it would ultimately be against the 2022 FIFA World Cup champions.

So Australia should be deeply proud of the Socceroos' performance at this World Cup. This is an event that never fails to unite the nation and also gather all Australians onto the same side of the fence to cheer for our country on the global stage. They are really exciting times as we embark on the Women's World Cup. Many games will be held in South Australia, in Adelaide and, as I said, close to two billion sets of eyes will be watching the world game take shape in South Australia. I commend this motion to the house.

Ms HOOD (Adelaide) (12:48): I rise to move the following amendments to the motion:

Delete clause (b) and insert:

(b) commends the Malinauskas government on its investment in soccer and its support of the FIFA Women's World Cup.

Delete clause (c).

I make note of the member for Hartley's motion as it originally stands, which says that we should uphold the former standards of the former government. That is why I stand here to make these amendments, because that is something that we on this side will not do. We will not do this because the former Liberal government set the standard pretty low. Basically pulling the pin on even seeking a FIFA Women's World Cup game here in Adelaide was embarrassing and sent such a devastating message to young women and girls in our state who love the world game.

On this side, though, we cannot wait to support the FIFA Women's World Cup games when they come here to Adelaide. Across the entire event, we are expected to draw record attendances of 1.5 million spectators plus an anticipated worldwide viewership of one billion spectators. When you hear numbers like that, it really does beggar belief that the former Marshall Liberal government could not be bothered to really fight for a great deal when it came to hosting the Women's World Cup here, and they were basically pulled onside kicking and screaming to attract FIFA Women's World Cup games here.

In regard to the motion, the government joins in congratulating firstly the Socceroos in their achievements at the 2022 FIFA World Cup and making it through to the round of 16, only the second time this has been achieved for the Socceroos. The excitement of watching our national team compete at the highest level was extraordinary and shows how much joy football brings to our community.

I know we had a chuckle last week when I visited Christian Brothers College and met with the leadership that, each night that there was a pretty exciting game on during the evening, there would be quite a few bleary-eyed football supporters rocking up to school the next day. I have to say that that did not just occur in schools but probably in workplaces across our entire state.

The Malinauskas Labor government was proud to team up with Adelaide Oval at the time to establish a free family-friendly live site event to stream the Socceroos and Argentina round of 16 match on the plaza's two big screens. I know I had very close friends there with their kids, who absolutely loved the atmosphere. The live site provided our community with the opportunity to come together to support our Socceroos, especially the South Australians in the squad: Thomas Deng, Craig Goodwin, Awer Mabil and Riley McGree.

The remarkable efforts of the Socceroos add to the excitement that is building as we get ready to host, together with New Zealand, the FIFA Women's World Cup this year. To make the most of this event coming to Adelaide, the state government has committed $1 million to deliver a number of legacy projects that will make a lasting impact on the sport of football here in South Australia. The legacy plan will focus on creating long-lasting participation, facility and leadership opportunities in football for girls and women.

We are also committed to ensuring a strong focus on using the platform of the Women's World Cup to increase public awareness and to promote lasting change around gender equality and eradicating violence against women. These projects will complement the work of the re-established Women in Sport Taskforce, which is working to empower more South Australian women and girls to participate equally in their sporting passions.

State Labor governments have a long track record of supporting the needs and growth of football in South Australia. This includes the State Centre of Football, having received $19 million in funding from the previous state Labor government. The Gepps Cross venue is equipped to host all levels of competition, from grassroots through to elite. It has hosted a camp with the Junior Matildas and will be used as a training ground ahead of the 2023 FIFA Women's World Cup.

As demonstrated by the commitment to the State Centre and previous $10 million synthetic surfaces fund and $24 million female facilities fund that were cut by the previous Liberal government, Labor governments are committed to supporting football here in SA and to ensuring it has the infrastructure it needs to grow in participation and flourish.

I personally cannot wait to cheer on the Matildas in their fight to become the 2023 world champions, which I know will inspire current and future generations of women and girls to love and participate in the world game. I commend the amendments to the house.

Mr PATTERSON (Morphett) (12:53): I would also like to rise to support the member for Hartley's motion that recognises the fantastic achievements of the Socceroos at the recent World Cup. Of course, the first time Australia (the male Socceroos team) made the World Cup was back in 1974, and then there was a big gap between that and the next time, which was in 2006 in Germany when Australia, to that point in time, achieved their best result, having a win and a draw.

Since then the Socceroos have qualified for the World Cup five world cups in a row, which is no mean feat, when you think about the quality of the sides that are there. Just to put it in perspective, at the 2018 World Cup, in our group—to get out of the group stage—Australia had to play France, Denmark and also Peru, who are top sides.

Fast forward to the 2022 World Cup and Australia again had to go through the qualifying. That started back in 2019—playing matches to qualify—and then with COVID there was a big delay, which disrupted that qualification process. It was only allowed to start up again in 2021.

During that qualification process, the Socceroos played just four of their 20 qualifying matches in Australia so were massively disadvantaged with the end that they had to qualify by playing against Peru in their final qualifying match. Of course, they had lost to Peru in 2018 in the World Cup 2-0. So they came up against Peru and, in epic scenes, the game went down to a penalty shootout, and our captain was subbed off for Andrew Redmayne, who some people lovingly refer to as the Grey Wiggle and who, by dancing around, managed to ensure Australia won that penalty shootout 5-4, very dramatically.

That allowed the Socceroos to travel to Qatar for the 2022 World Cup against some very good teams. Much to the chagrin of the member for Hartley, Italy was not able to join us in the World Cup, but certainly in terms of who we did play in our group stage, again, we found ourselves up against the mighty France, the reigning 2018 World Cup champions; Denmark, who we had met in 2018; and also Tunisia. So, again, you could nearly think of that as the group of death. It seems in each World Cup in the group stage the Socceroos end up playing the eventual finalists.

We did meet France in our first game and, amazingly, South Australia's own Craig Goodwin scored at the eight-minute mark, putting Australia up 1-0 against the reigning champions. From there, the quality of France did rise to the top and they ended up winning 4-1, with fantastic games from their established stars, principally among them Mbappé, who I think just today has been announced as the French captain.

We were down at the bottom of that group stage, looking up the cliff, really having to win both our next two qualifying games against Tunisia and Denmark. The game against Tunisia took on epic proportions, because a loss there meant we were out. The great scenes occurred when Craig Goodwin crossed the ball in and Mitch Duke scored to put us up 1-0, which was the eventual score, so again a South Australian involved in the goal set-up.

That led us to the final game of the group round against Denmark, the world's number 10. Maybe people thought we could have had a draw there and got through because of the results, but fantastically the Socceroos, being Australians, always play for the win and did so, winning 1-0. Again, this was off the back of great work by a South Australian. Riley McGree passed a beautiful through-ball to Mathew Leckie, who did about five dodges and kicked between the legs of a Danish defender to score in jubilant scenes.

That put us through to the World Cup. It was the first time we had had clean sheets in a World Cup, the first time we had had two wins. We then met the powerhouse Argentina—so not only having to play France, who ended up being in the World Cup final, but then Argentina, who went on to win it. There we went down 2-1, but again, special mention to South Australia's Craig Goodwin for his strike. Yes, it was a slight deflection, but it went through to the back of the net to put the score to 2-1, with a few chances. Even up to the last minute in injury time, the Argentinian goalkeeper had to do a miraculous save to hold us out.

Bearing where we are in time, there is a lot more to say, but it was a fantastic World Cup for the Socceroos. We commend them. We wish the Matildas absolute success in the upcoming 2023 World Cup. I seek leave to continue my remarks.

Leave granted; debate adjourned.

Sitting suspended from 12:59 to 14:00.

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