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It could be the first time that an Australian club comes home with continental silverware, and if that does occur, then the football aficionados of this land ought to speak of the achievement with pride.
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Or is there?
Sport is a great leveller and none moreso than football, which can bring a nation bursting with corruption, poverty and crime and give it a handful of World Cup victories. Football gives the world a level playing field, if only for 90 minutes. Unfortunately, in Saudi Arabia on Monday morning, the playing field of life will not be level.
Is it okay with the impassioned fans of the Wanderers that in Saudi Arabia women aren’t allowed out of the house unless their male guardian is with them? Is it all good according to the backroom staff at Parramatta Stadium that being drunk in Saudi Arabia wins you a flogging, and stealing loses you your hands?
Perhaps the Wanderers board thinks that it’s only a little bit juvenile that Jews – a faith to which the club’s president belongs – aren’t allowed in the land of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and anyone with an Israeli stamp on their passport needn’t get off the plane?
It’s unlikely that ‘yes’ is the answer to any of the above questions. It’s unlikely that any reasoned human being who has enjoyed the fruits of democracy, the fruits of equality and the fruits of human rights will tick the ‘yes’ box to the above questions.
So why is it cool to the Wanderers to go there, play in front of 70, 000 Saudi blokes who left their women at home, and not say anything? It’s not. It’s not cool at all. It’s totally un-cool. That’s not to say don’t play - that would be a terrible idea - but stand up, WSW, and stick up for what is right and just.
In school we all get taught to tell a bully he’s a bully; it’s right up there on the agenda on each kid's first day. When did we forget that message?
Saudi peoples are not bullies; that is not the allegation at hand. Far from it, in fact. But the message coming from that desert kingdom is one of control and oppression, and that’s each bully’s modus operandi. So what is going through the important heads in Sydney’s west? What about the FFA? What do they think ought to happen?
The Sydney Morning Herald reported on Tuesday that only 14 Western Sydney Wanderers fans will be making the journey to Riyadh for the historic clash, and only one of them is a female. The fact that that woman is 20 means nothing to the bureaucrats of Saudi Arabia. Like any less-capable being, she needs constant supervision from her male guardian. How can it be that a 12-year-old boy is able to walk around freely without the blink of an eye or the turn of a head, but a 20-year-old female needs to be supervised at a game of football? Even if she was 53 and well-travelled, provided she hasn’t been to Israel, she’d need the same supervision.
That’s crap, Australia, and we shouldn’t allow that to happen to a football fan from our country. As the old adage goes, all it takes for evil to triumph is for good men and women to do nothing.
Take note, Western Sydney Wanderers, and do something, because each and every young, impressionable football fan deserves it, and that’s way more important than any cup win.