2023 Fan Friendlies in Australia
A group of Australia Supporters, known as the “Aussie Supporteroos” are hosting “Fan Friendlies” in a few cities during the 2023 World Cup.
Right now there are plans to host matches around the Matilda’s group games in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane with a hope to organize a tournament during the weekend of the Finals (19-20 August) in Sydney. It is very reminiscent of the “Fan World Cup” that FIFA organized in Qatar 2022 (oddly, we never heard much about it while in Qatar).
For those wanting to kick a ball around while traveling and/or attending matches, it could potentially be a brilliant way to meet fans from around the world in celebration of the sport and event we all love so much.
We saw this idea advertised on Twitter, took some time to research the group a bit more and decided to create a post about it.
It appears this group has participated in friendlies at other tournaments (Russia 2018, France 2019) and has some experience organizing matches as well.
Are there any requirements to participate?
From their site: Participation in fan friendlies is open to anyone, regardless of age or gender. Note that you need to have a top of your national team, shorts and appropriate shoes; shinguards are optional but strongly encouraged.
How do you sign up?
Here’s a link to their signup form plus you can go directly into the tweet above.
Who Are the Aussie Supporteroos?
Quoting their website…
We are an informal community of football-playing supporters of Australia’s national teams, Matildas and Socceroos. We come from all over Australia and the world and we get together to play fan friendlies against supporters of national football teams from other countries.
Aussie Supporteroos were founded during the 2018 World Cup in Russia where our team played 11 friendlies in 5 cities against fans from 10 countries: France, Denmark, Peru, Algeria, Cyprus, Nigeria, China, Colombia, Spain and Russia.
We welcome both female and male players of all ages and abilities. During our 2018 World Cup tour in Russia dozens of players joined Aussie Supporteroos, with the youngest being only 12 and the oldest 64 years old. We were also the only team at the Fan World Cup in St. Petersburg to feature a female player.
In 2019 we significantly expanded our membership. During the Women’s World Cup in France, many female players became Aussie Supporteroos and in the match against The American Outlaws fan group in Lyon, 23 out of 27 players were female. We organised 7 friendlies in France, including matches in Valenciennes against the local football ultras group, in Grenoble against a team of nuclear scientists and in Lyon against a local police team.
Visit the Aussie Supporteroos Homepage Below:
https://www.aussiesupporteroos.org
