Matildas to face Wales in historic pleasant forward of Asian Cup marketing campaign

Matildas coach Joe Montemurro says October’s pleasant towards Wales can be a vital step in his squad’s preparations for subsequent yr’s Asian Cup.

The match towards Wales — the primary between the 2 nations in girls’s soccer — has been scheduled for October 25 in Cardiff.

The Matildas may also face a yet-to-be-determined opponent later in FIFA’s worldwide window.

Nevertheless it stays to be seen whether or not Sam Kerr, who has not performed since tearing her ACL in January final yr, can be made obtainable for the 2 matches.

“We need to benefit from the following few FIFA girls’s worldwide home windows and Wales is the proper take a look at for the staff as we’ve got by no means performed them earlier than and they’re a aggressive facet that may take a look at our model of play,” Montemurro mentioned.

“It is crucial that we benefit from each alternative collectively, to repeatedly construct on the relationships we’re forming and setting excessive requirements to boost our high-performance surroundings.”

Wales is ranked thirty second on the planet.

The Welsh are but to seem in a girls’s World Cup, however they did qualify for Euro 2025.

The Matildas solely have two extra worldwide home windows earlier than they kick off their Asian Cup marketing campaign towards the Philippines in Perth on March 1.

Montemurro was lacking a bunch of the squad’s greatest stars throughout his first set of matches in control of the Matildas earlier this yr.

The Matildas had been lucky to flee with an error-riddled 3–0 win over world quantity 38 Slovenia in Montemurro’s first match on the helm.

The outcome was adopted up by a 1–1 draw towards the identical opponents.

Alarm bells had been ringing when the Matildas slumped to a shock 1–0 loss to world quantity 56 Panama.

However a Michelle Heyman brace and Charli Grant’s 91st-minute aim rescued a 3–2 win within the second match of the pleasant collection in West Australia.

AAP