Cup of Nations: Caitlin Foord and Sam Kerr demonstrate why Matildas could realise ultimate World Cup dream

Forty third minute, Matildas smashing Spain 3-0. Two dynamos in gold, Caitlin Foord and Sam Kerr, produce a moment of synchronistic beauty that make you believe anything is possible in a World Cup year.

Playing up front together in a tactical tweak to the norm, Foord drops deep to receive the ball with time to turn and face forward. Just as Foord is about to receive, she glances over her shoulder to see Kerr jogging forward 20 metres away, waiting for her cue.

The cue is the glance.

Kerr takes off. Straight forward, fires out of a cannon. Foord gets the ball and, without looking at Kerr but knowing where she will be, fires an inch perfect pass to set the Chelsea superstar free.

The movement didn’t have the perfect ending – Kerr’s shot fizzed just wide – but every part of it until the last moment is a reason for unbridled hope in this, the Matildas’ biggest year of all time.

Kerr and Foord are regarded as world class by opposition players and coaches, and certainly by the 20,000 who witnessed them in Sydney on Sunday, but they don’t like to talk openly of their own greatness.

“She’s killing it at the moment,” Kerr said of Foord on Sunday.

She would know.

Kerr and Foord first met as kids, when part of the junior Matildas programs, before both made the natural progression to the senior Matildas team as teenagers; Kerr in 2009 as a 15 year-old and Foord as a 17 year-old in 2011.

They clicked, like twin sisters who finished each other’s sentences.

“It’s almost telepathic, we know where each other is going,” Kerr said. “We have such a good connection on the field, we can work off each other, read the game and change things within the game.”

A case in point against Spain: Foord’s goal from a pinpoint free kick delivered by her Arsenal teammate Steph Catley to make it 3-0.

Kerr was the designated target, but both quickly agreed, with one look at the Spanish defensive set up, they could both have a go.

“She was meant to be blocking for me and I told her don’t block for me, just get in,” Kerr said. “I should have gone myself actually because I would have had a goal!

“But that’s a huge amount of respect for each other. We can change within the game, we can do what we feel to drive the team and I think in the first half (against Spain) we drove the team really well.”

Foord and Kerr have now combined for 223 Matildas appearances, with 89 goals between them.

Tom Sermanni was there for the start of it all.

The ex-Matildas coach gave both players their debuts and can recall them as if they were yesterday.

“When Sam came in against Italy (in 2009), within a heartbeat you’re going, ‘Woah’,” Sermanni said. “She could jump like a gazelle, had pace, even at 15 she was overpowering people.

“Caitlin came in at 17, and in her first international against New Zealand in 2011, after ten minutes she got the ball, beat three players and scored.”

Sermanni, now working with the Canadian women’s team, has closely observed both players‘ evolution over the last 12 years in the national team, especially of late with their moves to England – Kerr with Chelsea, Foord with Arsenal – giving them a greater tactical understanding of the game.

“They’ve both become almost complete players,” Sermanni continued. “You’ve just got to be constantly on your guard. Sam’s just a natural goal scorer, Caitlin is slightly different. She can create more with her dribbling. Both are also quick, and strong but now they have the whole combination.”

Sermanni recalls Foord’s first ever World Cup game for the Matildas, against Brazil in 2011. Still in high school, Foord’s assignment was to contain Brazilian football goddess, Marta.

“She didn’t have a clue who Marta was, and didn’t care,” Sermanni said with a chuckle. “That sums up Caitlin. And, from memory, Marta barely got a kick that game.

“Both Caitlin and Sam had those Australian characteristics, right from the word go. Not giving a bollocks, not being fazed or intimidated.”

Matildas coach Tony Gustavsson is loath to tinker with the understanding Kerr and Foord have with each other, and he learned that lesson last November in Melbourne, in the friendly against Sweden.

The Matildas struggled early against a quality Swedish side.

A key reason was Foord becoming disconnected with Kerr in the formation Gustavsson had set up, with Foord more of a midfielder than a second striker, as she was against Spain.

“(Sweden) shredded us apart, for 30 minutes they played right through us,” Gustavsson recalled.

Never too proud, Gustavsson and his staff twisted when many would have stuck, pushing Foord up next to Kerr.

They defended as a duo and, in attack, were given complete freedom to cause havoc.

Foord scored twice, Kerr once in a 4-0 win.

“Seeing what they did against Sweden, you realise it’s about getting the right players in the right spot with the right mindset,” Gustavsson continued.

“If I tell them too much and give them too small of a frame and over-coach two players like that, I actually don’t think we’ll see what we saw (against Spain).

“What we saw (against Spain) was not me coaching Sam and Caitlin, it’s just me being lucky enough to put the right players in the right spot with the right mindset and then it pays off like that.”