Matildas' Head Coach Tom Sermanni praised debutant Winonah Heatley after the Matildas' 3-1 loss to Brazil. Heatley played 72 minutes in the match.
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00:00And as I said, I'm very cautious what I say here in the sense that I don't think the referee necessarily determined the outcome of the game,
00:08but she certainly determined how the game was played.
00:11And with her lack of control and allowing Brazil to basically rule it out,
00:20it changed the dynamic of the game and made it a little bit more difficult for us.
00:24So that certainly had, I think, an impact.
00:28Obviously, absences and injuries have caused you to make quite a few changes in that midfield.
00:33Winona Heatley got her first start. How do you think she played?
00:36I thought she did admirably, to be perfectly honest.
00:39I mean, she's come in late into the camp and she's mainly a centre-back,
00:47but we needed to have more of a physical strength in midfield,
00:53more of a defensive presence with the team that we had.
00:56And, you know, I thought she did ever so well.
01:00I think she ran out of legs a little bit, which is to be expected.
01:05A couple of times, maybe the tenth of the game, I don't know.
01:08But I think her run rate, I think the things that she brought down and the balls that she won,
01:15I thought she handled herself very, very well.