{"id":777548,"date":"2026-07-04T01:01:10","date_gmt":"2026-07-04T01:01:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/777548\/"},"modified":"2026-07-04T01:01:10","modified_gmt":"2026-07-04T01:01:10","slug":"if-you-want-to-reach-out-im-here-football-icons-touching-message-to-shattered-aussie-teen-sensation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/777548\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018If you want to reach out, I\u2019m here\u2019: Football icon\u2019s touching message to shattered Aussie teen sensation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Swedish football legend Zlatan Ibrahimovic has offered words of support for Lucas Herrington after the Australian teenager missed his spot-kick during the Socceroos\u2019 penalty shootout against Egypt on Saturday morning AEST<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Australia was eliminated from the World Cup after Harry Soutar and Herrington botched spot-kicks during a tense shootout, with Egypt progressing to the Round of 16.<\/p>\n

Herrington, who last month became the Socceroos\u2019 youngest World Cup starter, looked distraught after hitting the crossbar with the team\u2019s fourth attempt, all but sealing Australia\u2019s fate.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u201cLucas is such a great lad. Has a great head on his shoulders. Great professional,\u201d Socceroos teammate Aziz Behich told media after the loss.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just told him for him to even go up and put the ball down was enough for us. Expect big things from him in the future.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE<\/p>\n

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Australia’s Lucas Herrington. AP Photo\/Gareth PattersonSource: AP<\/p>\n

Speaking on America\u2019s Fox Sports coverage, Ibrahimovi\u0107 encouraged the 18-year-old Herrington to \u201creach out\u201d if he needed any support following the heartbreaking error.<\/p>\n

\u201cPenalty is like lottery. You score, you become a hero, you don\u2019t score, sadly you become zero,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI just want to reach out to Herrington. You\u2019re 18 years old, you\u2019re young, this is just the beginning of your career.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou stepping up there, you showed a lot of courage, not everybody will do that. My friend, you\u2019re the best. Don\u2019t listen to the rest.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cIt\u2019s not easy to step up there to shoot that penalty, and it\u2019s a moment of seconds. \u201cEither it goes well, or it goes not. But listen, Herrington, if you want to reach out, I\u2019m here.\u201d<\/p>\n

French superstar Thierry Henry continued: \u201cDon\u2019t be upset; you go there taking it, you miss. I feel for you, but keep your head up.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m thinking about the guy that allowed him to go. You should (say), \u2018No, this is not on you. We\u2019re going.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cSo fair play to (Herrington). I know you missed, but we\u2019ll see you again.\u201d<\/p>\n

Last week, Herrington contributed a team-high ten defensive interventions during Australia\u2019s group-stage match against Paraguay to help the Socceroos keep a clean sheet and qualify for the knockouts.<\/p>\n

He has been linked with a move to La Liga champions Barcelona<\/a>, where he\u2019s predicted to fetch a price of somewhere between $23 million to $30 million, according to the CIES Football Observatory.<\/p>\n

The current Australian record is Leicester City\u2019s $26 million purchase of Harry Souttar from Stoke City in 2023.<\/p>\n

Socceroos FUME after Bos is taken out | 00:30<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Swedish football legend Zlatan Ibrahimovic has offered words of support for Lucas Herrington after the Australian teenager missed…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":777549,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-777548","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777548","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=777548"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/777548\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/777549"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=777548"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=777548"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=777548"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}