For the last few days, the world has been overtaken by the story of two soccer sides – Croatia making the World Cup final and the Thai junior team being rescued from the flooded cave.
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Both underdogs in their own way. Both carrying the hopes of their nations.
Croatia, a country that has been torn by strife, with a population of 4.1 million (less than Melbourne), has defied the odds to make the biggest sporting event on earth.
It is a region with a long history as a kingdom, part of another monarchy, independent state, part of socialist Yugoslavia and now an independent republic.
The occupation by Axis forces in World War II provided Australia with many emigrants at the end of that conflict, many of whom found their way to Tasmania and provided the labour and skills that built our hydro schemes.
They also brought their love of the world game, setting up soccer clubs across the country, including the one I played for, which started in 1959.
A civil war in the 1990s provided another influx of Croats who taught me the game, two-foot tackles at training, all the good swear words and how slivovitz could warm you up when the wind was blowing so hard across Montello Park that a ball placed at the corner flag would roll off down the hill.
So if there was ever a team that Australia should support, it is Croatia - our soccer heritage is so entwined with many of our own champions hailing from the country.
Players such as Mark Viduka, Mile Jedinak, Zeljko Kalac, Jason Culina and Josip Skoko, who all captained the Socceroos.
Croatia will come up against a French team worth more than $1.7 billion, with superstars like Paul Pogba, Antoine Griezmann and rising star Kylian Mbappé.
It is Croatia’s first World Cup final and would be a massive story if they lifted the Jules Rimet Trophy.
But, clearly, the greatest underdog story involving a soccer team is that of the Wild Boars, rescued from the flooded cave after 17 days trapped underground.
It was and is a story that captivates the world; holding us together with collective bated breath. Even Pogba dedicated his team’s semi-final win to the Wild Boars.
I’m not the first to draw the analogy between the World Cup soccer teams, comprised of some of the richest athletes on earth, sharing the global stage with a soccer team of some of the poorest.
Jokes about Brazilian forward Neymar being sent to Thailand because he is a world class diver aside, there was an excellent cartoon in the Herald Sun of the Jules Rimet Trophy reimagined to have the people holding up the earth replaced with the divers in full wetsuit and breathing gear.
One Wild Boar critical to the rescue was Adul, whose ability to speak five languages – English, Thai, Burmese, Mandarin and Wa, his home dialect – helped communicate with the divers.
The New York Times reported that Adul’s parents, decendents of the Wa ethnic tribal branch once known for headhunting, crossed from Myannmar eight years ago and dropped him off at a church school where he became the top student. That, along with the coach writing apology notes to parents and forgoing eating to feed his players, is one of the stories of the decade.
The Wild Boars are already world champions. By the time you read this, Croatia, with any luck, might be too.
Živila Hrvatska!
- Mark Baker is Fairfax Tasmania and South Australia managing editor