‘It’s obviously devastating’: Gustavsson plays coy on extent of Kerr’s injury

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Tony Gustavsson has refused to give anything away about the extent of the calf injury that has thrown Sam Kerr’s World Cup involvement into severe doubt, and made no apologies for withholding the news until the last possible moment.

Proud and relieved after the Matildas’ gritty 1-0 win over Ireland, there was no hiding Gustavsson’s disappointment about the loss of his captain – a doomsday scenario he said he had planned for, but always avoided thinking too deeply about.

Matildas head coach Tony Gustavsson is continuing to keep his cards close to his chest about the condition of captain Sam Kerr.Credit: AP

Gustavsson said the 29-year-old hurt herself in the warm-up at Australia’s training session in Brisbane on Wednesday, just hours before he and Kerr fronted a press conference in which he declined to provide any updates to the fitness of his players.

Only when the teamsheets were submitted an hour before kick-off at Stadium Australia was it revealed publicly that Kerr was injured, and that she would miss not only the Ireland game, but next Thursday’s clash with Group B rivals Nigeria.

“First of all, I want to say I hope you respect and understand the reason when I sat here yesterday that I couldn’t speak openly about it,” he said.

“We knew she couldn’t play but we didn’t know what it was. We were waiting for the result of the scans. At 9.30pm last night, we had a meeting with the [medical] team and that’s where I got the exact news what it was.

“Sam is a massive part of Ireland’s game plan, as you understand, and we didn’t want to give that away in advance. But once we came to the stadium, we didn’t play any type of mind games.”

Gustavsson would not say anything more about how Kerr got injured, other than that it occurred during the warm-up, and he declined to go into specifics about the nature of her calf ailment when asked.

“She’s going to be out for two games, and then we’ll reassess afterwards,” he said.

“That tells you a little bit about what grade it is, but we don’t want to go into more details on that at this point.

“It’s obviously devastating for me, for Sam, for the players … I know we have a lot of questions on Sam here, but I always want to respect Sam and the team to not go in too many details of that at this point.

“What I can say is that Sam was very clear, early on, when she brought the team together and said, ‘This is not about me. This is about you. This is about the team playing tomorrow.’ She said the same thing today, she wanted the focus to be on the team and the players, and to be able to do that in that devastating moment for her personally, it says a lot about her as a captain.”

Gustavsson’s manner suggested that the Chelsea superstar is facing an uphill battle to be involved at all at the World Cup. Having come into the tournament with genuine hopes of being able to go all the way, Kerr’s prolonged absence would be a crippling blow to the Matildas’ broader ambitions, and would rob the event of one of its biggest individual drawcards.

There is only a four-day gap between Australia’s second and final Group B fixtures – the latter being the earliest Kerr could return based on Football Australia’s public timelines – and then another week’s break until a prospective round of 16 tie on August 7.

While there were some admirable elements about Australia’s victory on Thursday night, in particular their herculean defensive efforts in the second half, Gustavsson conceded that the Matildas struggled to generate clear-cut chances.

Vera Pauw, Head Coach of Republic of Ireland, instructs to Ruesha Littlejohn on Thursday night.Credit: Getty Images

But he said that had less to do with Kerr’s injury and more a factor of how well Ireland’s low defensive block had functioned, noting that Sweden and the United States also had troubles overcoming them in recent friendlies.

Ireland coach Vera Pauw said her tactical game plan had “worked perfectly” to blunt Australia’s attack, forcing them to resort to hopeful crosses and long balls from wide areas, with their only goal coming from the penalty spot via Steph Catley after a clumsy challenge by Marissa Sheva.

In any case, Gustavsson expects to confront an altogether different challenge against Nigeria, who face Canada on Friday in Melbourne, and do not play the same way as Ireland.

“We know we can do better in attack … I hope that playing the first game in the World Cup now, we’ve ticked that box hopefully mentally as well, [so that in] the second game it can help the attack a bit more,” he said.

“But there’s going to be very little football tactics to take away from this game that’s going to mimic the Nigeria game, so it’s kind of park this one, and then straightaway jump into the Nigeria game plan as soon as possible.”

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