PSA THE TILLIES ARE PLAYING TONIGHT, AND WE’LL BE THERE

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Okay SO Tillies ASSEMBLE! It would’ve been mega-difficult to miss this if you follow us on social media, but the Matildas will face Uzbekistan tonight at Marvel Stadium in Melbourne.

To say we are excited to have received media accreditation is an absolute understatement. It is a BIG deal for our own lil media startup, and we’re not taking it for granted. Our Melbourne-based sports reporter Hannah Cohen will be attending the game and (fingers crossed), chatting to the players. Who do you want us to chat to? Which players? Let us know!

We talk about soccer and the Matildas quite a bit, but there were two other key updates this week:

Football Australia also released a post-tournament report the Legacy ‘23 strategy, marking a significant milestone in the journey of Australian football. The report called for continued investment and support to build on the success and momentum of the 2023 Women’s World Cup. It also noted that there were 1,288,175 tickets sold for Australian games - CRAZY.

In other exciting news - Football Australia and Nike announced that from this week, Australian fans will be able to purchase the Matildas’ goalkeeper jersey in the iconic purple colourway worn by Mackenzie Arnold in the Women’s World Cup - more info below!

Shifting gears a little… we wanna chat ACLs. You may have seen this body part hit the news big time when the one and only Sam Kerr suffered an ACL injury during a mid-season Chelsea training camp. In response to this, Missing Perspectives gun Tash did a call-out on our Instagram and newsletter for stories from readers who have experienced an ACL injury. Thanks to everyone from Sarah in Sydney to Jen in Canberra who opened up about their experiences, motivated purely by wanting to help other women in similar situations.

Off the back of this, Tash has written an article exploring the links between ACL injuries and female athletes. It’s a space that hasn’t really been explored, and turns out, there’s a lot to unpack. See an excerpt below, but head over to missingperspectives.com to read the full piece and have a look at some of the data we collected through our survey.

We were really surprised by how many responses we received in response to this callout - and how it’s a really common experience. If you have experienced a similar injury and want to be connected with others who have gone through a similar experience, reply to this email and we’ll start a little community.

Chat again soon,

The Missing Perspectives Team xxx

Sam Kerr’s ACL injury is not an isolated case for female athletes

In January this year, Matilda's star and Chelsea striker Sam Kerr injured her anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) at a pre-season training camp in Morocco. And while fortunately, thanks to top tier medical care, she’s BACK BABY, as it turns out, ACL injuries are more common for female athletes. 

In Warrior Girls (2009), American journalist Michael Sokolove cites studies showing that young women who play soccer, basketball and volleyball suffer tears to their ACL (which btw, is the band of tissue that stabilizes the knee joint) up to eight times as often as men in the same "jumping and cutting" sports.

There isn't enough data on female athletes to say exactly why this is the case, but research shows risk factors include women tend to be more “quad dominant” than men, hormonal differences across the month (a Norwegian study of professional handballers showed women were more likely to be injured just before and just after getting their period), and resourcing differences between female and male athletes at both the amateur and professional level. 

We spoke to a commercial partnerships manager for the Sydney Swans, who noted that male and female AFL players train under different conditions. 

Being a professional AFL player is a challenge full stop, but for women, the situation is trickier. For example, AFLW Swans players train on less well-kept grounds across random spots in the Inner West of Sydney while male players have full time access to the Sydney Cricket Ground, often wear boots designed for men rather than women, and are more likely to be overstretched mentally and emotionally due to the need to work other jobs (both paid and unpaid labour) than their male counterparts to keep up their participation in the sport. 

An MP survey found that among 16 female athletes, they were on average 27-years-old at the time of injuring their ACL, most likely to be playing AFL or soccer, and the majority were playing a normal in-season game at the time.

Read the full article over at missingperspectives.com

'Iconic': Nike and Football Australia are now selling Mackenzie Arnold's purple jersey

Football Australia and Nike have announced that, from this week, Australian fans will be able to purchase the CommBank Matildas’ goalkeeper jersey in the iconic purple colourway worn by Mackenzie Arnold on the world stage last year.

The Matildas' jerseys are now on sale via Football Australia Online Store. The announcement comes after Lioness goalkeeper Mary Earps' jersey sold out in record time last year.

For fans wanting to show their support in the stands as the CommBank Matildas take on Uzbekistan in AFC Women's Olympic Football Tournament Paris 2024TM Asian Qualifiers, the jerseys will also be available for purchase at Melbourne’s Marvel Stadium tonight from merchandise outlets both inside and outside the venue.

With the team set to play in front of another full house this week, making it twelve sold-out home matches in a row for the CommBank Matildas, it’s set to be another high energy show of support.

Mackenzie Arnold, Nike athlete and CommBank Matildas’ Goalkeeper, who today released a heartwarming video capturing the moment she saw the retail jersey for the first time:

"The support we as goalkeepers have felt from our fans over the last year has been absolutely incredible. It means so much to me that we’ll head into another huge year for our team, and our sport, knowing that our families, friends and fans will be backing us all the way, and wearing our jerseys with pride.”

Read more over at missingperspectives.com