Matildas coach Tony Gustavsson is suddenly in damage control.
It’s fair to say Gustavsson was stunned by his team’s underwhelming — if not embarrassing — performance against Germany in their Paris Opener that led to the brutal 3-0 loss and a Olympics campaign virtually in tatters.
The Matildas — who were fourth both in the Tokyo Games and last year’s World Cup — now have a dramatic showdown with Zambia in Nice on Monday morning (3am AEST).
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Zambia was also beaten 3-0 in their opener against the US, and the Matildas must win (or at least draw and hope results go their way) to keep their faint hopes of making the quarter-finals alive.
They then play their final pool game against the USA on Thursday and will be praying for miracles — but it’s possible.
Gustavsson fronted the media after the devastating and deflating loss to Germany.
“I just want to say I’m so sorry to let down the fans back home that put their alarms on at 3am in the morning to get up and support us,” he said.
“It’s just amazing to see the support back home and I know we disappointed a lot of people.
“Please set the alarm for the next game as well because the players feed off the support they get.
“Hopefully we can make them proud against Zambia.”
Before the tournament Gustavsson was talking a big game.
The Matildas flew in to France on a private jet and Gustavsson talked about rolling out the red carpet for his high-profile stars.
But when push came to shove against Germany, several of those stars went missing.
“Listen, you know what? 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 loss three-nil, or baggage going missing … they never use these things as excuses,” he said.
“I want to be very real on that.
“I think we needed that as a wake-up call to say, ‘OK, now we’re in it’.
“Hopefully that was the rusty performance we hopefully needed to get out of the system and then come back against Zambia.”