Foot & Soccer Soccer Match Reports, Football News 
February 28 – Two years in the past Australia co-hosted the most important Ladies’s World Cup up to now. This month marks a 12 months to go earlier than the nation hosts the expanded 2027 Ladies’s Asian Cup, a match that when once more will break all previous information.
It’s a milestone and one other stage of the nation’s ambition to construct within the internet hosting experience of 2023 to carry extra main occasions to Australia.
“We’re very honoured we’re internet hosting the Ladies’s Asian Cup. It’s a massive alternative to proceed the wave of transformation we noticed main as much as and past our internet hosting of the Ladies’s World Cup in 2023,” mentioned Soccer Australia CEO James Johnson (pictured).
“It’s a likelihood to captivate the viewers in Australia and overseas. To carry our nation and hook up with the remainder of Asia.”
Johnson says that internet hosting the 12 finest staff in Asia may be very thrilling, declaring that girls’s soccer in Asia may be very aggressive.
See Venues unveiled for the Ladies’s Asian Cup Australia 2026
“I feel we’ve seen since 2019 the (aggressive) hole closing between groups. If we take a look at groups ranked 24 to 32 the distinction between high and backside is kind of small. Between 23 and 26 the hole closes up extra,” he mentioned.
Soccer in Australia has been rising at more and more quick charges. Participation in 2024 grew by 11% and 16% within the girls’s sport. Attendance at Matildas video games are rising year-on-year and Johnson says he expects that to proceed in 2026.
The success of internet hosting the 2023 World Cup has not simply boosted participation ranges, it has additionally raised the extent of company assist for the sport in Australia.
“The company assist we noticed within the World Cup was top notch and since then we’ve renewed sponsorships with Nike, Allianz and Coles Supermarkets, all are main sponsorship,” mentioned Johnson.
Equally there’s an ambition to construct soccer infrastructure, and with the Olympics in Brisbane in 2032, Soccer Australia has submitted plans for a boutique stadium within the metropolis of 20-25,000 capability.
Whereas the majority of Australia’s nationwide staff gamers ply their commerce within the skilled leagues in Europe, Johnson says the expansion in participation at residence will improve home alternative and competitiveness.
“We’re seeing a variety of gamers coming by the boys’s and ladies’s A Leagues. A strategic focus of ours has been to develop youthful gamers,” he mentioned.
“Nearly all of gamers in our nationwide groups are enjoying overseas specifically in England, Germany, the Netherlands and Italy. Our aim is to have extra Australia-based gamers.”
Proper now the main target is on delivering 2026. “We’re a really proud member of the AFC. We have now completely different roles and obligations for 2026. Our job is to ship on the bottom,” mentioned Johnson.
However there’s additionally ambition to do extra. “Wanting forward we need to construct on our internet hosting capability. We have now submitted an expression of curiosity to carry the 2031 Asian Cup right here and are exploring that chance. We’re additionally open to bringing the Membership World Cup to Australia,” he concluded.
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