Matildas assistant Melissa Andreatta named Scotland women’s coach

Lengthy-time Matildas assistant coach Melissa Andreatta has been appointed head coach of the Scotland ladies’s nationwide crew.

Andreatta has been assistant coach since 2019, and was appointed lead assistant underneath Tony Gustavsson in 2021.

Andreatta performed an important function in Australia’s run to the semifinals of each the Tokyo Olympics and the 2023 Ladies’s World Cup, and was additionally head coach of Australia’s first under-23 crew.

The Queenslander was Brisbane Roar’s A-League Ladies coach from 2016 to 2018, main the membership to the 2018 premiership, whereas additionally working because the Matildas’ assistant analyst.

Andreatta’s departure provides to an enormous overhaul of the Matildas’ teaching employees after Younger Matildas coach Leah Blayney took up an assistant coach function with Japan earlier this yr.

It opens the door for the incoming coach, extensively anticipated to be Lyon boss Joe Montemurro, to usher in their very own employees.

“Mel’s affect on ladies’s soccer in Australia at each a home and worldwide stage has been vital, the place she has been instrumental in not solely the event of present Matildas however the success of the crew over current years,” Soccer Australia head of nationwide groups Gary Moretti stated.

“Mel’s appointment as head coach of the Scotland ladies’s nationwide crew is just not solely deserved recognition for her achievements to this point however additional acknowledgement of the excessive regard for Australian coaches internationally.

“We want to thank Mel for her contribution to our ladies’s nationwide groups for greater than a decade and want her all the easiest with this new and thrilling chapter.”

Andreatta joins Tanya Oxtoby (Northern Eire) amongst high feminine Australian coaches heading up different nationwide groups.

Scotland didn’t qualify for the Ladies’s Euros however may have their eye on reaching the 2027 Ladies’s World Cup.

“I am completely delighted to be main Scotland ladies’s nationwide crew into a brand new, thrilling period,” Andreatta stated.

“The longer term is unquestionably vivid and with my intensive teaching, expertise improvement and main match expertise, my purpose is to assist the gamers and employees to succeed in their fullest potential.

“The ambition is to get Scotland again to constant qualification and with the squad in a interval of transition, that is the right alternative to begin constructing in direction of that future.”

Andreatta is anticipated to be in place, pending her visa, for Scotland’s Nations League match towards Austria on Could 30.

On the identical day, the Matildas play the primary of two friendlies towards Argentina at Docklands Stadium.

AAP