Brace yourself. The FIFA World Cup is coming. And you might not know it yet, but you’ll likely be on the bandwagon very soon.
Football, or soccer as we call it in this country, might be down the pecking order of our professional sporting codes — dwarfed by the likes of Australian Rules.
Look no further than the recent A-League Men’s grand final, which drew a TV audience of about 214,000. By comparison, last season’s Channel 7 AFL grand final broadcast had more than four million viewers.
But on a global scale, the round ball dominates. They don’t call it the“world game” for nothing.
And with an estimated six billion people expected to engage with the World Cup, a staggering 73 per cent of the total world population, it’s hard to disagree.
Despite the professional game being followed less here, according to Australian Sports Commission figures, 1.9 million people play soccer in Australia.
Compare that with basketball(1.3 million), netball (1.2 million), rugby league (1.2 million including touch, tackle and tag) and Australian Rules (625,000).
History shows when Australia qualifies for a World Cup, participation spikes.
Similar could be said for our collective interest in the sport.
This World Cup marks 20 years since the sports’ seminal moment in Australia.
Having previously qualified for the tournament only once, in 1974, and having endured a series of near-misses in the decades that followed, the 2006 breakthrough is Australian sporting folklore.
Legendary goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer, who was at the centre of the dramatic penalty shootout that secured Australia’s berth and the subsequent run to the round of 16, believes its significance can’t be understated.
“We helped change the path of football in Australia,” Schwarzer told The Sunday Times.
“Australia wasn’t qualifying for World Cups as kids growing up, so you were supporting other countries.
“We knew that qualifying for a World Cup in 2006 was going to be game-changing. We just didn’t realise how big it was.”
Australia has qualified for every World Cup since 2006, a feat made to seem even more remarkable by the fact 2006 champions Italy have now three in a row.
Schwarzer says this has raised the bar for the country’s expectations.
“Now we’re at a point where we don’t believe we should just be qualifying,” he says.
“That is a bare minimum. It’s now about what we can do in a World Cup.”
Unlike 2006, this Australian squad lacks some big-name firepower, but makes up for it with youthful exuberance.
Australia have 17 potential World Cup debutants in their 26-player squad.
Drawn with co-hosts the USA, plus Turkey and Paraguay, Tony Popovic’s team face a tough battle to advance out of the group stage as they did in 2006 and 2022.
But as Aussies, we love nothing more than an underdog story. We pride ourselves on it.
And millions of us will be glued to our screens, no matter what time of day or night, hoping for the right result.
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