Matildas star Tameka Yallop drops bombshell family news – and her teammates can’t hide their joy

Matildas star Tameka Yallop has delighted her fans and teammates by revealing she and wife Kirsty are expecting their second child.

The veteran of 132 games for her country announced the happy news on Instagram, posing for a photo with Kirsty and their daughter Harley as she held a sign reading ‘baby Yallop due October’ and a series of printouts of her mum’s pregnancy scans.

‘We have been hanging out to share this special news… Harley is bursting with excitement that she is going to be a big sister. Baby Yallop number 2 coming soon,’ Yallop wrote.

The news saw several of her teammates send heartfelt messages.

‘Stopppp. Congrats guys!!!’ wrote Mackenzie Arnold.

‘OMG yayyyy!!! Congrats guys,’ added Charli Grant.

Their post on Instagram drew heartfelt messages from Yallop’s Matildas teammates, including Mackenzie Arnold, Charli Grant and Emily van Egmond

‘Harley is bursting with excitement that she is going to be a big sister,’ Yallop wrote

‘Congrats Meeks. So excited for you guys,’ wrote Katrina Gorry.

The Matildas’ official account, Courtney Nevin, Michelle Heyman, Emily van Egmond,  Clare Hunt, Kyah Simon and Ellie Carpenter all chimed in with messages of their own.

Kirsty – who played for New Zealand’s national team before her retirement in 2018 – gave birth to Harley five years ago.  

Yallop will be hoping to add another cap to her collection after being named in the Matildas’ squad for the upcoming friendlies against South Korea on Friday and Monday.

Last month she revealed she felt she had no option but to keep her sexuality hidden for nearly ten years for fear of judgement and not being accepted. 

‘I had two separate lives, I kept it away from my family and my school life at the time and for me it was really just my teammates and my environment around football where I could relax and get on with who I was,’ Yallop told News Corp.

She added that she might have come out earlier if initiatives like the A-League’s Pride Round had been around while she was maturing.

‘Everyone’s journey is still quite different and it really depends on your home environment that you grow up in,’ Yallop said.

‘That sort of inclusiveness didn’t really happen until it was more visible to them that there were lots of other people in the community that were like me.

Yallop (pictured left with Harley and Kirsty) will be hoping to add to her 132 games for her country as the Matildas face South Korea in a pair of friendlies

The national team has come together in Sydney with injured superstar Sam Kerr (Yallop is pictured playing for the Matildas in the 2023 World Cup)

‘Until they started to see more of it was when I felt comfortable coming out.

‘I think having that exposure and people being able to see it as normal, really does help change people’s opinions and make people a little bit more open-hearted.

‘I saw the change in my family first and that is what made me comfortable with coming out.

‘It was like my two worlds merged and I could just be comfortable, be myself whether that’s in public or privately.’

Yallop and her teammates are being joined in Sydney by injured superstar striker Sam Kerr ahead of their first friendly at Allianz Stadium.

It’ll be the first time Kerr has been in camp with the team since she was found not guilty of racially harassing a police officer after her bombshell trial in a London court.

On Monday, Football Australia announced that Kerr will retain the captaincy of the national team once she returns to the field.

FA also said Aussie fans don’t know the full story about what happened on the fateful night that landed Kerr in court.

‘Knowing how Sam [Kerr] feels about the events, along with the additional context we’ve learned, has added vital perspective that the general public may not be aware of,’ FA chairman Anter Isaac said.

‘Setting aside those difficulties, this one incident should not offset the incredible contributions she has made, both publicly and privately, on and off the field – for more than 15 years.’