Yahoo Sports City in Australia: Tour Diary – Part One
Almost a week after landing in Australia, City’s first match in the Perth International Football Cup is nearly here.
Gareth Taylor’s squad arrived in Perth on Wednesday and have spent the last six days adjusting to the Australian timezone, training hard and tasting aspects of local culture.
Now they’ll face Leicester City at 11:15 (UK) on Wednesday 28 August in the first semi-final of the tournament.
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Should we win, we’ll play the winner of West Ham and Paris Saint-Germain on Thursday, while a defeat would see us face the loser in that tie.
Both matches will be available to watch on mancity.com and our official app with an active CITY+ subscription.
Here we’ll take a look at each day so far in a little more detail…
Wednesday 21 August
With advance staff already in Perth, players and coaches ended an almost 24-hour journey by reaching the club’s base around 20:00 local time.
The three Japanese internationals on tour – Yui Hasegawa and new signings Aoba Fujino and Ayaka Yamashita – had landed from Japan a few hours earlier after time off following the Olympics.
Cue the big reunion between Chloe Kelly and Hasegawa, with Kelly jumping off the bus and shouting “I just want to see Yui!”
Mary Fowler was also waiting at the hotel, while Alanna Kennedy timed her arrival to coincide with the bulk of the squad.
WATCH: Watch: Training in Perth before friendship bracelets with fans!
With almost all of the travelling squad now in Perth – just Laia Aleixandri to come – there was a high spirit amongst the group, despite the weary minds after such a long journey.
The first dinner in the hotel was followed by introductory speeches from Gareth Taylor and Managing Director Charlotte O’Neil, who both promised a fulfilling trip.
Thursday 22 August
After breakfast, the players set off on a walk of the local grounds – a beautiful, green area alongside Perth’s famous Swan River.
Mary made herself a hero to one baby turtle on the walk, picking it off the path and guiding it back to the safety of the grass.
Our photographer was there to capture the moment, which made it on to national news later that evening.
Then came the first opportunity to speak to the players in a formal setting, with Khadija ‘Bunny’ Shaw, Lauren Hemp and Kerstin Casparij all clearly overjoyed to be in Australia even with the bleary eyes that come with jetlag.
And so to the base of Football West, the local authority covering the sport in the state.
Unfortunately named the Sam Kerr Football Centre after the Chelsea striker and their local hero, the training ground was built for last summer’s World Cup.
A state of the art centre, its Scandi-style decor inside made a lot of sense when it was revealed to us as Denmark’s base during the tournament.
Analysis and gym work began in the afternoon, before heading out on the pitch. It’s winter in Perth, but conditions were much the same as a Mancunian may expect in August.
With temperatures approaching 20 degrees Celsius, heavy downpours and strong winds had caused some issues on grassland around the area but the pitch we would use was fit for purpose.
The wind remained throughout the session, which saw Fujino and Yamashita training with the team for the very first time.
As we were leaving the ground, a local girl’s team had gathered outside to get photos of some of our stars – with Matildas Fowler and Kennedy particularly grabbing their attention – before waving the bus off.
Friday 23 August
The familiar weather continued, with grey skies and heavy rain at times.
That didn’t perturb the players of course, who completed a morning gym session before taking to the pitch.
At the same time, the pitches outside of the Football West centre’s main pitch was being used for its first ever international tournament – in walking football!
Teams of people aged 50 and over from Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia were all in attendance.
It was City’s training session that captured the attention of the office staff however, with them using their lunch break to line up at the window and point out every member of the squad, cheering every goal scored.
The afternoon saw more opportunities for catching up with the players, including a chat with Fowler on the joy of being back in her homeland and being able to show it off to her peers.
Saturday 24 August
Our first weekend in Australia began with an open training session, with local girls teams invited to watch the stars.
A brief and ferocious downpour didn’t perturb the excited crowd, who were treated an 11-v-11 match for more than half the session.
At the end of the session, our players signed shirts, took selfies and exchanged friendship bracelets they’d been preparing since arriving in Australia.
Particularly sweet was Vivianne Miedema’s interactions with two youngsters, swapping bracelets she’d made the day before with an incredibly excited boy and another with a girl.
Hard work from volunteers and local authorities has seen women’s football grow exponentially in the area in the last two decades, with last year’s World Cup in the country having a massive effect also.
At the heart of it all is Mancunian Vanessa O’Brien, who moved to Perth 20 years ago and immediately got to work building an infrastructure for young girls to play football.
She is now part of Kingsley Westside, which boasts 11 teams and more than 170 girls all playing football each week.
O'Brien says her players were gobsmacked when the opportunity to meet some of their heroes came up at this session.
The lines of beaming faces on their way out of the complex told you everything you needed to know.
Sunday 25 August
A day off for the players meant one thing to most of them. Coffee.
The Australians pride themselves on their coffee and our players were not about to let this opportunity to pass them by. Armed with tips from Fowler, Kennedy and friends who have been to the city, they set off in search of the best best beans
The afternoon was spent with another of Australia’s great passions. Australian Rules football.
A group of players and staff headed off to the nearby Optus Stadium for Fremantle Dockers v Port Adelaide in the AFL.
There they met the Dockers’ women’s team, who explained both the rules of the game and the importance of the match in front of us.
Fremantle had to beat second-placed Port Adelaide in order to squeeze into the top eight and qualify for the finals.
They didn’t manage it, but it was an incredible experience to see a sport unique in so many ways that has gripped a nation.
45,000 packed into the stadium to watch a physical and brutal match, played on a pitch that also hosts cricket.
A fun evening for both our players and the Fremantle Dockers women’s team ended up with the Freo side invited to our matches at HBF Park later in the week.
Monday 26 August
A return to training at the Sam Kerr Football Centre saw Gareth Taylor lead his side through a series of technical and tactical drills, the fruits of which we will see once the season kicks into gear.
At the end of that, Mary Fowler and Vivianne Miedema met up with Perth Glory’s Grace Johnston, Georgia Cassidy and Mischa Anderson to talk all things Perth, women’s football and the growth of the game around the world.
With training over and a quick lunch taken, it was on to Caversham Wildlife Park on the outskirts of the city.
It’s home to some examples of iconic Indigenous Australian species including koalas, kangaroos, wombats, emus and birds of prey.
After some initial hesitation, Kerstin Casparij, Lauren Hemp, Alanna Kennedy, Leila Ouahabi and Jess Park looked like naturals handling the koalas, feeding the kangaroos and stroking a wombat.
WATCH: Man City Women visit koalas, kangaroos, wombats and more!
However, there was plenty of fun to be had – including Hemp scaring Kennedy by squawking down her ear.
Later that night, the squad was complete. Laia Aleixandri was the last to arrive having gone all the way to the bronze medal match at the Olympics, but arrive she did.
The Spanish defender has come off the back of an incredible holiday, getting engaged before celebrating her birthday.
Tuesday 27 August
The day before our first match of the tour saw attention turn to the task at hand.
Gareth Taylor and Jess Park both spoke openly about where the squad are currently at in terms of our preparation, stating that there’s still a long way to go before we’re ready for the start of the Barclays Women’s Super League season next month.
Taylor also took a contingent of players to a special lunch held in the city, designed to celebrate women in football.
There they gave talks on the game’s growth in Australia and around the world.
Now, all attention turns to HBF Park and the Perth International Football Cup...
A part two of our Australian tour diary will follow next Monday.
Australia Tour 2024
Both of City’s matches in Perth will be globally available to watch on mancity.com and our official app with a CITY+ subscription.
First we play Leicester City at 11:15 (UK) on Wednesday 28 August, before facing either Paris Saint-Germain or West Ham United on Sunday 1 September.
CITY+ is available via an annual subscription of £34.99 a year, saving you £24 on our monthly offering.
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