England’s senior women’s and men’s soccer teams will face Australia in a unique double header on April 11 and October 13 respectively.
The Lionesses, who will take part in the World Cup to be co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand in July, will make a perfect tune-up against Australia at Brentford’s GTech Community Stadium as they take their world cup preparation a notch higher. With the match taking place just six days after competing in the inaugural Finalissima at Wembley against Brazil, coach Sarina Wegman welcomed the move and pointed out that “Australia will give everything to impress” with them going to co-host the 2023 FIFA Women’s World Cup.
Sarina Wiegman said: “We are always looking for different challenges and we are really happy to play two more strong non-European teams in Brazil and Australia in April. They will both be competitive at the World Cup, and Australia will give everything to impress because they are going into a home tournament with big expectation. They will want to show they are in good shape for the finals.”
Further commenting on the match and how far it goes in fine tuning the team for the World Cup, the Lionesses coach said, “We know Australia have players at the highest level, so for us it is another opportunity to see where we stand in our preparation for the World Cup.”
For The Three Lions, a date with Australia awaits on October 13 at Wembley.
Gareth Southgate was appreciative of the effort to give his Three Lions a chance to size-up against different opposition for their match against Socceroos , having last met in an England’s 2-1 win in 2016.
Commenting on the match, Southgate said, “This will be a good challenge for us as Australia performed well at the World Cup despite against having four tough opponents. I imagine there will be a strong Aussie contingent in London for both games. We all know the sporting rivalry between our two countries and that alone will add an extra edge.”
Tickets for England Women v Australia – Alzheimer’s Society International – will go on sale from 12pm on February 21 exclusively for My England Football members. General sale takes place from February 22.
