"The Matilda's loss isn't about men vs women, it's about cultural belonging."

On Thursday, Mark Bosnich made some pretty flippant comments about the Matildas’ losing to the Newcastle Jets’ under 17’s team during a practice game.

He implied that their performance justifies the fact that they are paid so much less than the Socceroos.

“The Matildas, the next time they say they want to get paid like the Socceroos, I’d be bringing this up.”

Yes, the Matildas’ lost 7-0 to the young Jets.

Despite the fact that it was a practice game, with the purpose of trialing new plays (for which the Jets were told how to approach the match), Mark’s comments have turned this situation into another debate about: ‘Why men’s sports are better than women’s sports,’ and ‘Men are better at sports than women, so they shouldn’t be paid the same,’ which is basically: ‘Here’s another reason why gender inequality is valid.’

These things don’t really get to me anymore; after a while, it all becomes white noise.

But in this particular instance, it did, because I understand why Mark made those comments.

Like Mark Bosnich, I come from a Croatian family in Sydney’s South-West. My grandparents migrated to Australia to escape communist Yugoslavia of the early 1960s, as did thousands of their peers – including Mark’s family.

Former Socceroo Mark Bosnich. Image via Getty.

When my grandparents and their peers arrived, they didn’t have money, they didn’t have much in the way of family, and they didn’t know if they’d ever see their homelands again.

They had no choice but to rebuild their lives and their communities here, and soccer was one of the ways they made Australia home.

In a time where the migrant communities were linguistically isolated, soccer was a huge part of nation-building. Amongst Italians, Greeks, Serbians, Lebanese and other migrant groups in the post-war era, soccer was intrinsic in developing connections within and among all these diverse cultural communities, contributing to a transnational ‘wogness’ and to the development of contemporary Australian culture as we know it.

Like Mark Bosnich, I grew up in a family that lives and breathes soccer.

My uncle was a Socceroo, my dad was the President of Sydney United during the old NSL days – which is coincidentally, Mark Bosnich’s old club – and we grew up attending Sydney United games every Sunday afternoon.

It wasn’t just about the soccer; it was an exercise in cultural belonging.

Sydney United supporters. Image via Getty.

Croatians are extremely proud of the contribution they’ve made to the development of soccer in this country. Think Mile Jedinak, Mark Viduka, Tony Popovic – all Australian soccer legends that come from Croatian families.

As a kid, I remember watching Mark Bosnich play in the English Premier League, filled with pride that someone that who came from my area, who started his career at my club, had actually made it to the big league.

Even though my teachers at school couldn’t pronounce my surname, and my peers at school often made me feel like I wasn’t a “real Australian,” people like him made me proud to be a part of the community that I come from.

So when role models like Mark Bosnich, who you’ve grown up feeling connected to and in awe of, make comments like this, it really sucks.

It’s a reminder of the downside to cultural belonging: your experience and your participation is hugely dependent on your gender.

While I would go to the soccer games every week and often watch matches on TV, I never really got the chance to play soccer in a formal capacity.

My dad was my brother’s soccer coach when he was little, and I remember asking when I would get to play for a real team, too.

I was crushed to learn that there were no girls’ soccer teams at our club.

“Soccer is a boys’ sport," I learnt.

I played netball instead. Until, of course, I became a teenager – a time when girls' sport was relegated to a social activity not to be taken too seriously – and I finally got to play for a soccer team in high school.

I know that things have changed now, but I can’t help but feel that the sentiment is the same: sure, girls can play soccer, but boys are better, so really it’s still just a man’s game.

That’s what I hear when Mark says that he “supports equality, but this is a question of meritocracy.”

No, it’s not. It’s another way of delineating cultural power, and propagating entrenched gender norms.

It says to women and girls – especially to ones with experiences and cultural identities similar to my own – that their culture is not their own, and that their participation is still limited and conditional.

And that’s a devastating message to have to receive about a sport that you love from a role model within your own community.

Matildas vs. China in 2013. Image via Getty.

I think comments like these stem from a sense of vulnerability that comes from feeling like an outsider is encroaching onto something that you own, or something that you feel safe and happy doing - it's natural to want to protect the thing that you love, because you don't want it to change.

Perhaps even more so, you don't want to feel inadequate doing something that you're good at.

Maybe that's where Mark's comments come from: the women's national team has achieved more global success than their male counterparts on the same stage.

While the two don't need to be compared, because the men's leagues and the women's leagues actually play the game very differently, I can imagine that it would bruise some egos from the men's side: no one likes feeling vulnerable and inferior, so it's only natural to defend your own point of view - but you shouldn't have to drag others down to do so.

Sure, he’s just one individual and doesn’t speak for the whole community. He’s entitled to his own opinion – professional or otherwise – and it’s not his responsibility to protect my feelings. But as someone with a lot of influence in the industry, and who also holds a lot of cultural power in the Croatian-Australian (and wider migrant) community, his words do have impact, and he should be aware of that.

It’s these sentiments that stopped me from playing soccer, I don’t want it to continue to affect other girls and women.

This is why the success of the Matildas is so important. For me, they represent an important point of my intersectional experience, and it’s awesome to see women who are a similar age to me, who come from my country, playing a sport that I wish I got the chance to play, who are kicking arse on the global stage.

Watching the Matildas succeed finally allows me to be a part of a sporting culture that I was locked out of for so long.

Matildas celebrating. Image via Getty.

I can’t help but notice that the surnames of the Matildas’ line-up are nothing like my own – strikingly different to all of the Australian mens’ teams since about the 1960s, which are full of Croatian, Serbian and Bosnian ‘-ichs’ – and I can’t help but feel like I know why.

I can’t help but feel like my experience – and probably, the experience of others like me – is part of the reason.

But I hold hope that this will change.

Even though I didn’t get a proper chance to play, more girls now do. The same way that soccer in this country took decades to come to prominence – and has arguably only done so in the past 10 years, following the Socceroos' qualification for the 2006 World Cup in 2005, and the creation of the A-League in that same year – women’s soccer is still in its infant stages.

Hell, it’s still new in most countries, and we should be proud that the Matildas are world leaders in this field.

Given the time and funding that men’s soccer has had for more than half a century, the women’s leagues will develop, and the nature and pace of the women's game will change.

More importantly, it will contribute to cultural change that will give girls a real chance to play.