Matildas’ coach ups ante

ANTE Milicic has a message for his Matildas: we ain’t done nothing at this World Cup yet.

Yes, beating Brazil was brilliant and featured flashes of Australia’s trademark attacking fluidity.

But the coach still sees defensive fallibilities requiring attention heading into up to three games in 10 days, starting with tomorrow morning’s decisive final group clash against Jamaica in Grenoble.

“My feeling is that we’re going to get better as we keep going in the tournament, but at the same time there’s definitely some areas we need to improve on, and improve on quickly,” Milicic said.

“At the moment we’re still getting punished and we’re doing things awfully difficult.

“The Brazil win doesn’t mean we have achieved anything in the tournament, this win means we’ve now started the tournament.

“We’ve put ourselves in a position now where it’s in our hands to win the next game and progress to the next round.

“As we stand here today, we haven’t qualified for the next round, let’s not forget that.

“We have to earn the right to be in the round of 16 ... we are not looking at the scenarios, we’re just focused on ourselves and we really want to put in a good performance.”

While that may be the case, it would be remiss not to have one eye on the knockout stages. An unlikely first-place finish would reap the reward of a seven-day turnaround and an easier opponent — potentially Nigeria, China or Chile — back in Montpellier.

Finish second and it’s a four-day back-up in Nice, likely against Norway or Nigeria.

And, should the Matildas squeeze through as one of the better third-placed teams, a far tougher assignment awaits against heavyweight hosts France in Le Havre.

“If that came to it, bring it on,” said forward Emily Gielnik.

“I’d love to play France. Like, why not knock off the world No.1 in their own country? That’s such a big challenge and if that comes to us, the last thing we want to be is fearful of that.”

Milicic must decide whether to field his strongest XI against Jamaica or shuffle the decks to rest weary legs.

Key trio Emily van Egmond, Chloe Logarzo and Ellie Carpenter sat out training yesterday and Elise KellondKnight peeled off on her own for at least part of the session, though Milicic said it was all precautionary.