Coach Tony Gustavsson has apologised for the Matildas "letting down" Australian fans with their dismal Olympic Games opening defeat but expects them to make the country proud again.
The Tillies’ Swedish mentor admitted he didn’t think his World Cup semi-finalists had been ready for the challenge of meeting Germany, who outplayed them 3-0 in Marseille on Thursday.
But he's adamant the picture isn’t completely gloomy and is backing his side to hit back on Sunday when they face Zambia in a must-win contest to keep their hopes alive of making the quarter-finals.
“I just want to say I’m so sorry to let down the fans back home,” Gustavsson said.
“I know we disappointed a lot of people.
"Congratulations to Germany; they were a class better than us, that's just facts.
“You can clearly see that Germany were up to the speed of international football. We've done everything we can to try and prepare for that, so it wouldn't be too big of a surprise, but I don't think we were ready for it."
The Matildas had suffered setbacks before the tournament when their baggage was left behind in Spain and key players were struggling with injuries.
But Gustavsson was offering no mitigation.
“The one thing I know about this team is that when they’re backed against a corner and there’s a lot of s*** thrown at them with curve balls and different ways, a three-nil loss or baggage going missing, they never use these things as excuses," he said.
“I guess there’s a lot of disappointed fans out there. They might not think it was worth getting up at 3am. I promise you it’s worth it, because these players feel it and need it.
“What we need to do now is learn from this game, delete it as soon as possible, have two days for Zambia (in Nice), and hopefully we can make more people back home proud at that game.”
Much needs to be improved, though.
Gustavsson admitted his team were “upset” to concede two goals from corners through slack defending and reckoned they had been tactically outmanoeuvred by the world No.4 side Germany, who sat back and hit fast to shred the sluggish Australians on the break.
Steph Catley’s side also lost the physicality battle hands down.
“This side is so physical normally, we win all the one-on-one duels, there’s aggressiveness there, we’re running and our speed beats teams. But it wasn’t really there,” said Gustavsson.
“Is everything really bad? No. There's parts in that first half when we moved the ball really well, and we can show that we can break teams down.
"There's frustration from the players because they're trying, they're trying, they're trying. What we need to do is be real and say, 'Okay, let's use this as a wake-up call. We're in international football now and we have no time to dwell.’
"This is a reality-check in terms of where we are right now. I don't think our performance today represents the whole four-year development journey; I think it represents the challenges that we had going in.”
Zambia won’t be pushovers in group B, despite their 3-0 loss to the USA on Thursday.
Having been three down in 25 minutes and reduced to 10 after a sending-off five minutes later, they didn't concede another goal for an hour against the world No.5 side.
