‘We weren’t playing kick and giggle’: the Matildas’ honorary first skipper

PO’C: No. There had been women playing at various times in Australian history, but at that time there was very little. The “ladies” would only play in white sandshoes because they were afraid that if they wore soccer boots they might get hurt with studs. And it was just social soccer. So at the end of the season, Joe and I said, “Why don’t we try and form our own team and play seriously and try to build this game up into a regular sport for women?” So we put an ad in the Sydney newspaper asking for any women or girls who wanted to join a serious team, so we could get going in establishing a real competition.

Fitz: You placed it in the Herald, I hope?

PO’C: (Laughs). I can’t remember! But from that first ad we got Trixie Tagg, who played strong soccer in Holland with the guys, and Christel Abenthum from Germany, plus two lasses who had played in Manchester, and another who’d played at a high level in Scotland. This was fantastic for me, because these were women who were much better than me, and so I was suddenly on a learning curve. And we got a few local girls interested and then the big breakthrough came, which was a call from a gentleman who asked if we wanted to join Sydney’s Prague soccer club, and be their first women’s team. It helped that his 15-year-old daughter and her friend wanted to play with us, which we welcomed.

Prague were First Division, a really big club at the time, and we grabbed it – Joe as coach, and me as captain. They supplied us with uniforms, training field, and they let us play at halftime of the men’s games, sometimes stretching it a bit so we could play longer. Soon, they were putting us on as curtain-raisers against women’s teams who were forming in other clubs.

Fitz: Did it feel like you were revolutionaries, carving out a new sporting world for women?

PO’C: It felt like we were building something that one day would get very big. And we were coming from all over the world, different countries, and playing with and against each other in a game we loved, that was building in the country we all loved, Australia. We all believed that if we kept working hard on and off the field, it would grow. The big thing was when one of the mothers approached us and said her 11-year-old girl had been a cheer-leader for the men’s team, but now decided she wanted to train and play with us. So we said, “Fantastic, we’re training on Tuesday, and tell her to come along.” And she came along at 11 years old and never left.

Fitz: RAH!

PO’C: More and more girls started to join, and so Joe and I said, “Why don’t we try and form our own association to encourage other teams to join and spread the word?” So we formed the Metropolitan Ladies Soccer Association in early 1968 – I was secretary – with four teams. There were a few men who got a bit “iffy”, but once they saw us play they knew we weren’t playing “kick and giggle”. A few more teams joined, and we played a visiting Queensland club team – which we won 4-2 – and we heard too that there was a strong women’s competition going on in Perth.

Fitz: Time to go national?

PO’C: Just about. First, Joe and I and our whole Prague team went over to the St George Budapest Club where we continued to win – and as a matter of fact we were unbeaten for 10 years, and I was the top-scorer each year. But we also formed our NSW Women’s Soccer Association in ’74, and I was secretary again. We organised the first national championships in August of that year in Sydney. Socceroos coach Rale Rasic selected me as player of the tournament and presented me with his 1974 World Cup tracksuit jacket, which I still have. It was one of the proudest moments of my soccer career. And it was also at those championships that the Australian Women’s Soccer Association was born.

Fitz: I am guessing you were secretary?

PO’C: Yes. And that was when it really took off.

Fitz: What happened?

PO’C: Early in 1975, I got contacted by a fellow from the Asian Ladies Football Confederation, and he said, “I just wanted to let you know that the tournament we’ve been talking about all these years is being organised but it’s no longer a club tournament. It’s going to be an international tournament, the 1975 Asian Women’s Cup. Can you send your national team?”

Fitz: And to that point Australia had had no women’s national team?

PO’C: That’s right. And ringing around, it turned out the other states would prioritise the 1975 National Championships which were going to be on at the same time, and so wouldn’t free their players. But the NSW team was already far and away the strongest team nationally anyway, so the head of the ASWA said to me, “You go ahead and organise it, but make sure you get the OK from the Australian Soccer Federation. The ASFA were great, and said, “You’ve got our blessing, you will represent Australia.” So we were away!

Fitz: And did you wear green and gold, and were you called “the Australian team”?

PO’C: Of course we were! I was captain, and the whole thing was extraordinary. From a decade earlier having no real competition at all, here we were as a pretty good team, flying into Hong Kong! Back home we had done car washes, lamington drives, sausage sizzles and a walkathon to raise money for airfares, but once we got there, we were picked up on buses, put into the three-star Intercontinental Lee Gardens Hotel with all expenses paid, and taken to dinners where we sat beside generals.

Fitz: And how was the actual competition?

PO’C: We were up against New Zealand, Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand and Malaysia and played at the packed Hong Kong Government Stadium – and they treated us like they would treat a men’s national team. There was an opening ceremony, where we all marched in our uniforms with our national flags, into the stadium behind a police band. Nothing was too good for us. And we ended up coming third!

Fitz: Congrats on being personally selected in the Asian All Stars team. Now, even though the actual “Matildas” didn’t come into being for a few more years as the name for our national women’s team, do you feel like the first captain of the Matildas?

PO’C: Of course I do. Why wouldn’t I? All those games we played in the first Asian Cup in 1975 were, and still are, recorded as ‘A’ international matches, which is matches between national teams. And we were representing Australia.

Fitz: You were inducted into the Football Federation of Australia Hall of Fame in 2001. But do the modern-day Matildas themselves recognise you?

PO’C: You’d have to ask them. I don’t know. But whatever they think of me, I’m the No. 1 supporter of the Matildas. I was there at the beginning. My late husband, Joe, was always there as well. And you know, I sit down sometimes and I think I am so glad that we did what we did. We stuck in there. We had hard times, but it was worth it, when you think of what’s happening today.

Fitz: Whether or not you and your ’75-ers are recognised as the founding Matildas, it seems to me it would be a great thing if you were flown over from Perth by Soccer Australia to the opening match. Would you come?

PO’C: I am already coming. Puma is flying me and three other interstate members of our team over to Sydney to meet with our 1975 teammates and we will all be present at the first Matildas game against Ireland. The 1975 New Zealand team are also being flown over to be with us.

Quote of the week

“Now can we imagine a world, in Australia, where women didn’t have the right to vote, where their voices weren’t heard? No we can’t. So I’m hoping in another 120 years’ time we’ll look back on this moment and say: ‘Can you believe we almost missed that opportunity?’” - Cate Blanchett on the Voice to parliament

Tweet of the week

@NatMartin30: “Honestly, just f---g mankad Stuart Broad at Headingley and let’s become a republic. Go all in.” Works for me.

Joke of the week

Q: What’s the difference between a dead chicken on the road and a dead trombonist in the road?

A: There’s a remote chance the chicken was on its way to a gig.