US visit an early taste of what’s to come when New Zealand hosts Women’s World Cup

OPINION: Phillip Rollo is a Stuff sports reporter.

It dawned on me as soon as Gonzalo Montiel slotted the match-winning penalty to give the Lionel Messi-led Argentina their third World Cup in a dramatic men’s final at Lusail Stadium in Qatar.

The next Fifa World Cup tournament will take place in our backyard.

The Women’s World Cup, co-hosted by New Zealand and Australia in July and August, promises to be the biggest sporting event our country has ever seen.

We will get our first taste of what is to come when the world champion United States tackle the Football Ferns in two warm-up matches in Wellington and Auckland next week.

The 2019 Women’s World Cup in France drew a global audience of 1.12 billion people.

That is 150 million more than the last men’s Rugby World Cup.

2023 will be even bigger.

Women’s football has gone from strength to strength in the last four years and the global showpiece has expanded from 24 teams to 32.

Last year’s European Championships were a roaring success in England, the hosts beating Germany before a record crowd of more than 87,000 in the final at Wembley Stadium.

The star-studded Barcelona club team have been drawing record-breaking crowds at the Camp Nou in Spain, playing in front of more than 90,000 people.

Most of their rock star squad, including two-time Ballon d’Or winner Alexia Putellas, will be here in New Zealand in July.

Amazingly, her team, Spain, will be based in Palmerston North in between games.

30,000 international fans are expected to descend on New Zealand for tournament, 20,000 of them from the US alone.

But it is hard to wrap your head around the sheer magnitude of the World Cup and what it means for New Zealand to host a tournament on that scale given women’s football’s relatively low profile here.

Until last year the Football Ferns had not played at home since 2018, New Zealand got its first professional women’s team in late 2021, and it is only this season that they are actually playing their home games actually in Aotearoa.

Most of the Football Ferns ply their trade overseas and in leagues that are not broadcast live in New Zealand.

Their players aren’t household names like the Silver Ferns are, and the Black Ferns have become on the back of their stunning World Cup win, nor are they anywhere near as successful, but the depth of the competition is considerably greater.

Football is the global game.

Most of the players at the Rugby World Cup were amateur. The top tier of female footballers are getting paid north of $350,000 a year.

New Zealand is not blessed with a world-beating talent with the star power that the US have with prolific striker Alex Morgan who has been on the cover of Time magazine and starred in her own Netflix film.

Defender Abby Erceg was the closest thing we had, captaining North Carolina Courage to multiple NWSL championships. But she has decided to retire from international football and won’t be at the World Cup.

The Football Ferns have slipped to a record low world ranking of 24, and they have tasted victory just four times in their last 30 matches.

They have never won a match at a World Cup but will be hoping the home support can get them over the line after drawing a favourable group; playing Norway, Switzerland and cup debutantes the Philippines.

The match against the 53rd ranked Philippines, who they beat in a friendly last year, looms as their best chance to score that elusive win.

Win that game and progression to the knockout stage becomes a much more attainable goal.

Without a host of first-choice players, there’s a very good chance the Football Ferns will get thumped by the US next week.

Seventeen of their 19 meetings have ended in defeat. The last four have been by five-goal margins.

The two games are being played outside the window where clubs must release players and the US have arrived close to full-strength as most of their players play in the American NWSL and it is their off-season.

But the US team’s scouting mission to check out the facilities they will use during the World Cup is one of the many spin-offs that comes with co-hosting the global showpiece and it will give New Zealand an early chance to see a world-class team in our own backyard – something that rarely happens.

Previously we have had to rely on visits from touring men’s club teams like David Beckham’s La Galaxy, Premier League sides West Ham United or Argentinian powerhouse Boca Juniors if we wanted to see international stars play here.

But it’s never been a Brazil or a Real Madrid.

In six months, the best female players on the planet will be coming to a city near you, the likes of Morgan and Putellas playing in Auckland, Hamilton, Wellington and Dunedin, and even training in Palmerston North.