Australia

This is the best summary I could come up with:

With the warm glow of the Women's World Cup beginning to fade, now is the time to take a deep breath, reflect on what the tournament meant for hosts countries Australia and New Zealand, and look forward to where its legacy might lie.

In the giddy aftermath of the Matildas' run to the semi-finals, the players partied, Nikki Webster was unfrozen from her carbonite slab to clamour out Strawberry Kisses one last time and Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk handed the team the keys to Brisbane and promised them a statue outside Lang Park.

It's true, the Matildas finished fourth at the World Cup after losing their semi-final against England and the third-place play-off against Sweden, but if you didn't realise this was about more than the final result, you would have to have an extremely dim understanding of the human condition.

Anyway, I'm sure Palaszczuk's idea can be finessed a little – perhaps the Matildas statue could focus on Cortnee Vine's winning penalty against France at the ground, the high point of Australia's campaign, or be more of a flat relief sculpture (as suggested in Nine newspapers).

This is encouraging, but there's a lot of work to be done to meet the requirements of an expected massive surge of girls playing football in the wake of the World Cup and ahead of Brisbane's hosting of the 2032 Olympics and Paralympics Games.

Before the World Cup we talked to local clubs who were excited at the prospect of an influx of girls playing football, they were worried about how their already stretched facilities would cope.

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