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Australia defender Nathaniel Atkinson has compared his salary situation with that of France star Kylian Mbappe, in a bid to explain just how difficult it was to keep up with the PSG forward.
Atkinson was handed the unenviable task of marking Mbappe in Australia’s 2022 World Cup opener against France on Tuesday evening.
Despite leading the match early on, Australia felt the full force of a talented French team, with Didier Deschamps’ men running out 4-1 winners.
Former Arsenal and Chelsea striker Olivier Giroud netted a brace, with Mbappe and Adrien Rabiot also on the scoresheet for Les Bleus.
Australia defender highlights Mbappe financial situation
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Full-back Atkinson admitted that he could have handled the situation around France’s second goal better, but took confidence from the fact that there are two more group games to try and recover.
“It’s a good experience, obviously it’s an eye-opener,” said Atkinson, as reported by the Socceroos. “There’s a reason why he’s earning 200 million dollars a year and I am where I am.
“It’s good to come up against this calibre, you know what you have to work on and I know what to fix, I’ve played that scenario 50 times over and I could probably come up with 50 different solutions, but that’s football.
“I’m disappointed, I’ll take full responsibility for the second goal, but it’s time to move on from that and the beauty is I’ve got a game in three days to fix that.
“That’s the beauty of the World Cup and just tournaments in general, anything can happen, you’ve just seen what the Saudis did against Argentina.”
Thank you for the incredible support from the stands as always 💚💛🇦🇺#Socceroos #GiveIt100 pic.twitter.com/EYM09dKRJs
— Socceroos (@Socceroos) November 22, 2022
France prove their worth on the big stage
Australia right-back Atkinson has taken confidence from the opening stages of the game, with the Socceroos having taken the lead through Craig Goodwin after just nine minutes.
But the Hearts defender also touched on the class of the defending champions, who rightfully headed into the competition among the favourites to lift the trophy.
France boasted the likes of Mbappe, Antoine Griezmann, Ousmane Dembele and Giroud in their front four on Tuesday evening.
Their class was on show for the world to see, with the result coming despite pre-tournament injuries to Karim Benzema and Christopher Nkunku.
“We’ve come up against the World Champions and there’s a reason for that, they’re a good footballing team and we can take confidence from the way that we played in that game early on,” said Atkinson.
Australia prepping for Tunisia clash
Graham Arnold’s side were handed a hugely tough opening fixture, but the difficult games are set to continue for his men. They take on Tunisia next on Saturday, before meeting Denmark in their final Group D game on November 30.
Atkinson was one of three World Cup debutants in Australia’s starting back four, with 11 Socceroos players in total making their debuts in the competition.
The defender noted the mix of experience in the squad, but highlighted the togetherness after the defeat to France.
“We’ve got a good mix of experienced players and young players and we’ve obviously got a lot of players here who are at their first World Cup,” said Atkinson.
“When I came into the changing room my head was down but the first people to come up to me were the experienced players, who talked about their experiences but they said the beauty is in three days’ time we’ve got another game.”
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