Right hear, right now: Mackenzie Arnold spot on for Danish challenge
By Vince Rugari
Mackenzie Arnold has learnt the hard way that, as a goalkeeper, you can’t afford to dwell on your bad games for too long. But upon reflection, she may have figured out precisely what went wrong for her against Nigeria.
The Matildas custodian opened up to this masthead on the eve of the Women’s World Cup about how being fitted with hearing aids earlier this year had changed her life off the field.
Mackenzie Arnold doesn’t play with her hearing aids in - but that doesn’t mean they don’t impact her performance.Credit: Getty
On the field, she does not wear them - but that does not mean they do not make a difference to how she plays, and after being prompted by a question on her hearing loss at her press conference on Thursday, something seemed to dawn on her.
That day, she forgot to put them in.
“It’s funny that you actually [ask] that,” she said. “Because I obviously wasn’t too happy with my performance against Nigeria, and I look back ... I didn’t wear my hearing aids that whole day. Maybe my brain wasn’t stimulated enough?
“I’m not sure. It’s just a lot of things I do tie back to my hearing now. I do feel a lot more confident within myself when I have them in, and I feel like I’m a lot more alert and connected – so whether that has a connection with how I play or not, I’m not too sure. But I would like to think it does.”
In April, at the behest of her brother Sam, Arnold saw a specialist in London, where she plays her club football for West Ham United, and was told she had lost a significant proportion of her ability to hear high frequencies, such as the “s” and “t” sounds, and some other consonants.
After sharing her story publicly, she was praised for helping to destigmatise hearing issues in young people – although remembering to put her hearing aids in each morning is seemingly a challenge she is still grappling with.
“I check my phone in the morning, and I’m trying to get into my routine that I put my hearing aids in because, right now, I’ve forgotten [again],” she said.
Not that Arnold had an absolute shocker against Nigeria – she was partly at fault for their third goal, a “miscommunication” between her and Alanna Kennedy, and could have perhaps done better at the corner kick which led to their second.
Sam Kerr celebrates with goalkeeper Mackenzie Arnold, right, after Steph Catley scored Australia’s fourth goal against Canada.Credit: AP
Regardless, coach Tony Gustavsson stuck with her for Monday night’s 4-0 win over Canada, in which she repaid the faith with a handful of strong saves late on in an impressive display by the 29-year-old, who appears just about immovable between the sticks for Australia.
“That’s just part of the job. Like a striker scoring, it’s my job to save goals,” she said.
Teammate Clare Polkinghorne said: “Macca’s in the form of her career. She has belief in herself and confidence in herself, which we all had in her, but she was probably lacking herself. I’m really, really proud of how far she’s come and what she’s been able to achieve.”
This is Arnold’s first World Cup experience as an active player, and it has been a long time coming. She sat on the bench as an unused substitute through two previous editions in 2015 and 2019, and was also stuck on the bench for the Tokyo Olympics and for most of last year’s Asian Cup.
“More, to be honest,” she said when asked if the tournament had been what she’d expected. “It has just been unreal. Especially the feelings that I get when that the girls score, it’s something that honestly I can’t even put into words. It’s been unreal. The crowds, it’s just been something that I would have never even imagined.
“I remember being asked about what I’m going to expect heading into the World Cup. And I just said, ‘Oh, yeah, big crowds, family, friends, whatever’ – but looking back now, I could never have said what has happened.”
Now that the Matildas are in the knockout stage, Arnold could have an even bigger role to play if any matches – starting with Monday night’s round of 16 clash with Denmark – go to penalties.
She has a positive shootout experience to fall back on, too, having saved three spot kicks in a row to guide Australia past Thailand in the semi-finals of the 2018 Asian Cup.
“I know historically, we probably haven’t gone too well on penalties. But we’ve been practising, and I’ve been talking with my coaches, just getting little things right,” she said.
“Penalties are 50-50. If you save it, you save it; if you don’t, you don’t. I don’t feel much pressure. I feel quite comfortable and if it comes down to that - hopefully it doesn’t - I’m more than confident.”
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