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One afternoon in mid-1999, Kate McShea, a talented young defender from Redcliffe in Queensland, arrived home from high school to find a letter on her dining room table.
It was from Chris Tanzey, the head coach of Australia's women's national team. He was writing to offer the teenager a scholarship to be part of the extended Matildas squad that was preparing for the Sydney 2000 Olympic Games.
McShea was stunned. She hadn't played for the senior team before, but already knew Tanzey from his time coaching her in the youth program. He rated her tenacity and game awareness, and felt that with a year of full-time training, she could be an important asset as Australia contested their first ever Olympics.
Letters like this were sent all over the country and all over the world. Australian striker Sunni Hughes and defender Cheryl Salisbury were playing in Japan when they received their calls home, while Alison Forman and Sharon Black were in Denmark.
One by one, they each travelled from wherever they were on the planet to settle at the Australian Institute of Sport in Canberra. 25 players would call its compounds and carparks home for close to twelve months as they prepared for their home Olympic Games.
"I think, at the time, I was in disbelief," McShea said.
"Everything came through my parents. I was only 16 at the time so I needed their consent.
"Being so young, I was naive to what was happening. It's not until now that I think about how torn my parents would have been at the time: so proud that I was fulfilling my dream, but their youngest daughter was moving away at just 16."
Women's football had only been introduced to the Olympic program four years earlier, at Atlanta 1996. But Australia had failed to qualify for it after finishing bottom of their group in the FIFA Women's World Cup the previous year, which doubled as the Olympic qualification path back then.
This time, though, was different. As the hosts of Sydney 2000, the Matildas got an automatic spot in the tournament, which meant a wave of additional funding from the federal government to ensure the team was as prepared as possible.
Full-time football was still largely out of reach for women players in the late 1990s, and unlike the current side, less than a handful played their club football overseas. So the prospect of staying, training, and playing football at the AIS for a year was a no-brainer for majority of those called into camp.
But for those who had struck gold elsewhere, such as Hughes, the choice was a bit trickier: stay with their professional clubs, where they were on $60,000 contracts, or cut their time short to link up with the national team, where they were paid just $700 a month.
"There was little recognition of the value of playing in other country's national leagues," Hughes said.
"We were told that we had to come back, otherwise we may not qualify for the side. The coach wanted eyes on us here, so we had to give up quite lucrative contracts at the time to come back and play.
"The Japanese league was really strong, but none of the coaches had been over there to see what the calibre was like, so I don't think they really considered that it would be of benefit. The level of games we had every week really refined your abilities, and if we'd had a league back here that was that strong, that would have been fantastic. But there wasn't.
"We were professional over there. We were full-time: playing, training, resting, recovering. All those things that come with just focusing on your sport.
"I don't regret having to come back at all, but I just think that wouldn't happen today."
And so each of them flew into Canberra, with most of the team staying in the same block on the AIS campus, while a few others who already lived in the territory were able to stay elsewhere.
Squeezed together for their longest ever preparation period before a major tournament, the players naturally became very close: they ate, trained, played, and just generally hung out together whenever they got some down-time, which wasn't often.
Hughes described it as being "on a hamster wheel": training 40 hours a week, with two sessions on most days, and games against boys or men's teams on Wednesdays and Saturdays. They'd play mini-World Cups each week in five-a-side formats, with games getting so hectic and competitive that some players would leave them with injuries.
When they weren't training, some players still maintained their other jobs that they used to support themselves in their regular lives. Forman, for example, had relocated to Europe after joining Fortuna Hjørring in 1992, and would sometimes disappear into the small computer room at the AIS to keep up her work as a translator back home.
"It was really exciting, because it was the first time where we felt like full-on professional footballers," Forman, who captained the team at Sydney 2000, said.
"It was a fantastic time being at the AIS, preparing for something we'd never been to before.
"We lived in a block together with all the other people going to the Olympics from the Australian team. I would never change it. The unity that we formed - because we were there full-time - it was just great times with the gang.
"The friendships and the bonds that we formed within the team at that time was the most amazing part. Like I said, it was the first moment that we actually felt like we were professional with the Matildas. Even now, we still hang out and we're still connected, and I love that."
Preparation for the Olympics was more than just physical; it was psychological, as well.
McShea remembers walking out before Wednesday night games to the FIFA anthem before standing in line and singing the national anthem, with the music booming out from loudspeakers that had been set up beside the field.
"Chris Tanzey didn't want us to be over-awed by the situation, so wanted to make it as normal as possible," she said.
"So we'd be playing against a local Canberra side, and we'd have the two anthems playing. And then, given it's the Olympics and there's 50,000 people and you won't be able to hear each other, we had this crazy noise that sounded like trying to tune a radio - this crazy crackling noise - coming from the speakers to simulate the crowd.
"Then we had to stay up really late and then drive back to play a game the next day. Because we played before the opening ceremony, and then I think our next game was the day after the ceremony [which the team attended], so we had to do a simulation so we knew what it was going to be like.
"Staying up and then going and playing the next day kind of prepares you, but even after all that, nothing can really prepare you for a major tournament like that."
Another activity that brought them closer together was the infamous nude calendar that some of the players had participated in that year to increase visibility and raise funds for their Olympic campaign.
Hughes said she went through "a bit of a battle with my inner feminist" about taking part in the spread, but the amount of money offered - $1,800 at first, followed by roughly $10,000 for the second edition after the first one rapidly sold out - convinced her do it.
"But we didn't even get paid [the full amount] in the end!" she said. "The guy that did it took off with our money!"
A month before the Olympics began, the Matildas travelled to China and North Korea (one of the last Australian national teams to do so) to play a series of friendlies against both sides. They lost three of the four games, with a penalty shoot-out win over China their only victory.
While the team was busy preparing overseas, back in Canberra at Bruce Stadium, officials were getting the pitch ready to host 11 of the Olympics' 48 football matches, including the opening game between Australia and Germany.
Renovations had been delayed after the Canberra Raiders made the semi-finals of the 2000 NRL season, but even after the grass had been re-laid in early August, an inspection by the Sydney Olympics Organising Committee (SOCOG) found that the new grass - which had secretly been flown down from Cairns, against the advice of the organisers - had suffered thermal shock in Canberra's winter temperatures and died.
Even more bizarrely, sections of the dead grass had reportedly been painted green to look like it was healthy in order to pass the inspection. But one of the local organisers had let slip to a journalist in attendance that the grass was actually not up to scratch, leading to a full-colour spread in The Canberra Times the next day exposing the fraud.
John Coates, the vice president of SOCOG at the time, threatened to take all the games out of Canberra if the pitch wasn't fixed. The local organisers scrambled and managed to address the issues in time to pass a final inspection before hosting the Matildas' first group game.
Due to it's longer length of the football tournament, Australia's opener against Germany actually occurred a few days before the official Opening Ceremony. Instead, there was a mini-Opening Ceremony conducted at Bruce Stadium before the game, with dancers and flags and speeches conducted out on the newly-laid grass.
A few minutes before they left their change-room, Forman gathered the group together and delivered a little speech.
"It was the straight-up motivational stuff, as usual: representing Australia, first Olympics at home, we want to go out and do the nation proud," she said.
"And I think we really did. When I look back at the Olympics, it was the start of the change for the Matildas where we actually proved we could play football. There were a lot of good players in the squad. I think it changed women's football in Australia at that point."
Hughes couldn't separate the excitement from the nerves as she lined up in front of almost 25,000 people opposite Germany, whose own team contained some of the players who'd go on to become legends: Steffi Jones, Birgit Prinz, Ariane Hingst, Nadine Angerer.
"I always got nervous before games, but it was good nerves; I was never shitting myself," she said.
"Playing at home, being in front of home crowds, was a real buzz. You know, when I started playing soccer, we never had those aspirations of 'I'm going to be in the World Cup or Olympics,' because those things didn't exist.
"So to have that happen was pretty mind-blowing. You felt so humbled and so lucky to be standing there in that first XI in front of a home crowd.
"That game, we lost 3-0, but Julie Murray, my best mate, pulled her hamstring. So that was tough for a few other reasons. They're the highs and lows of sport, really. But to lose to Germany, a monolith in women's sport... our biggest player was Cheryl Salisbury, but she looked small compared to their team.
"They were so strong and so big and so talented and skilled, so to lose only 3-0 was good. We were hoping for a draw, at best. But we put on a pretty good show against those girls, I think."
Two days later, the Matildas were in Sydney, shuffling through the tunnel beneath Stadium Australia alongside the rest of Team Australia, ready to walk out into the arena during the official Opening Ceremony of the Games.
"That was my biggest 'awe' moment," McShea said.
"Walking along with other elite athletes - like, Ian Thorpe was there, all the famous swimmers - walking out of the tunnel, was a full goosebump moment.
"Then, to walk up, and when the stadium realised it was the Australian team entering, the roar... it was something I don't think I will ever feel again. I get goosebumps now even just talking about it.
"It was a spiritual experience; a whole-of-body feeling. It was amazing."
Forman wasn't there, though. She, along with a few other Matildas, decided to sit in the stands to watch the ceremony instead ("for some reason I wanted to save my energy for the match the next day"), clapping and waving to their team-mates as they walked past wearing their memorable red, yellow and green outfits.
As they'd rehearsed months beforehand, their second match of the group stage took place the following afternoon at the Sydney Football Stadium. Fuelled by the adrenaline of the previous night, as well as the roar of support from over 33,000 home fans, Australia secured a famous 1-1 draw against Sweden.
Cheryl Salisbury made history by scoring the country's first ever Olympic goal, heading home a corner in the 57th minute to give Australia a 1-0 lead, before Sweden equalised through a penalty in the 66th minute.
"I remember me and McShea hanging under [Cheryl's] arms during the celebrations, and Kate saying she was under the smelly armpit," Forman laughed.
"It was different. With the crowds that came out to support us, it was huge for us. To score a goal and hear the crowd... you could feel the ground move. I still remember it."
McShea was flooded with relief, while Hughes was filled with pride for her team-mate who she felt never got the attention or plaudits she deserved.
In fact, Hughes thinks they could have won that game but for an untimely intervention from a spectator in the stands.
"There was a beautiful ball put through from the midfield by Amy Wilson, and I was running onto it," she said. "But then somebody in the crowd blew a whistle, and I thought I was offside, so I pulled up.
"But then the ref has yelled, 'play on!' at which point I'd already slowed down and the play had kinda died.
"I was gutted. And I spoke to someone a couple of years ago who said they were in that part of the crowd and heard it as well, so it must have been some little shit in there who thought it'd be funny.
"Anyway, that stuff happens. I still dream about that whistle going off, though."
But Hughes would have her revenge in the third and final game of the group against powerhouses Brazil.
With their progress to the semi-finals hinging on a win, Australia came out firing against one of the all-time great Brazil sides, anchored by the brilliant Sissi.
It was a tight first 30 minutes. While Brazil had most of the ball, the Matildas had most of the chances. A young Alicia Ferguson had a volley fly over the crossbar in the eighth minute, while Sharon Black did the same in the 11th. Hughes was one-on-one with the goalkeeper just on the half-hour, but her strike sailed straight into her arms.
Then, in the 33rd minute, with the noise of the crowd building after every half-chance they created, a whipped cross from the Ferguson on the left wing bounced towards Hughes, who was stationed a few metres outside the box with her back towards goal.
Controlling the cross with a single left-footed touch, the striker then juggled it once on her right knee, before flicking the ball backwards over her head - spinning away from two Brazilian defenders in the process - before bringing it down into the grass, darting past one more defender in the box, and swinging her foot through the ball so hard she fell over.
"It was like it happened in slow-motion," Forman said. "What she did... it was just out of the ordinary.
"It was so Sunshine. It's what she could do at her best."
For the first time in her career, Hughes ripped her jersey off and twirled it over her head as she was crash-tackled by her team-mates, lost in the noise of the 30,000 people in the stands who roared so loud it made the sound crackle in the broadcast coverage.
"My dad is responsible for that goal," she said. "He always taught me about having the element of surprise. That particular move was best suited down the sideline - if you got the ball, you could just turn someone and go around the outside.
"If you've got someone right up your bum, and you've got your back to them, everyone thinks you're going to play it back. But if it's a bobbling ball, you can just flick it over your head, out and around, and the defender's still standing there like, 'what the hell just happened?'
"I grew up watching Johan Cruyff and John Barnes, so many of those skilful, tricky players who I would always get outside and try to emulate.
"So at that point, I was in no-man's-land. I think there were a couple of players behind me - I knew there was one right up close, but I felt like I had a bit of space - so I just... I don't even know. That stuff is just muscle memory. You're in the thick of the moment, you're in the flow, and you just do what you've tried 1000 times before... and it came off.
"It was just one of those things that, after all those years of playing, of having a ball at my feet, with my dad and my friends in the crowd... yeah, it was a goal that captured all the fun and all the joy that soccer has given me."
While Australia went into half-time with a 1-0 lead, Brazil would snatch two goals back in the 56th and 64th minutes after two sloppy pieces of Australian defending, knocking the Matildas out of their first ever Olympics.
"It was pretty devastating," Hughes said, "but what do you do? We were gutted, but we did ourselves proud, all things considered."
The striker remembers the scenes immediately after the Brazil game: even though she had scored that memorable goal, there was barely any media waiting around to speak to her. Most had already left after the men's game earlier on in the day.
"There was like two people there: a cameraman and an interviewer, and the one thing they asked me was: 'would you consider doing another calendar?'
"I don't even think they asked me any relevant soccer questions. That was it."
But while their Olympic dreams may have been over, the Games themselves continued.
The whole team was funded to stay in the athlete's village until the very end, so many of the players spent the rest of their time as fans, securing tickets to random events like tennis, volleyball, swimming and athletics.
A bunch of them even managed to sneak into Stadium Australia to watch Cathy Freeman win her famous 800m gold medal.
Others, like Forman, took some time away instead. The captain, still dealing with the "devastation" of elimination, drove north to see her dad for a few days and tried to process what she had just experienced.
"At the start, I couldn't let myself enjoy that, because the whole 'dream' thing was a little bit heavy," she said.
"So I took a time out, then went back and partied and hung out with all the other athletes and it was absolutely amazing.
"Everyone went through their own thing. We have the fondest memories, either way, regardless of results."
McShea remembers being allowed to stay at the village until the end of the Olympics before returning to school, where she'd tell her class-mates about playing keepy-uppies with Pat Rafter and Lleyton Hewitt outside their cabin, which they made their own "Matildas" sign for, or chatting with Ian Thorpe and Muhammad Ali in the dining hall.
The singer Marcia Hines, who'd written a song for the Olympics called "Time Of Our Lives," even made a surprise guest appearance at the small common grass area in the village where she sang for everybody.
"People talk about post-tournament blues, and that was one hundred per cent me," she said.
"We had to move from the AIS back home, to then go back to going to school every day. Like, I'd just experienced the most amazing thing, and now I was sitting in a maths lesson like it had never happened.
"It was a big change getting back to life in Queensland, back to training, back into everything. It was a huge adjustment for everyone after being in that live-in program and being full-time footballers for such a long time."
It's only in the last few years that some of the players who represented Australia at the first Olympics have fully realised the impact they had and the legacy they left.
They didn't think of themselves as pioneers back then. They were just a bunch of women who loved football, and wanted to go as far as they could with it.
"We were just doing what we needed to do to make the team as successful as it could be," McShea said.
"And the success of the Matildas over the last couple of years, you're just extremely proud. It was a real family, and still is for the girls now, but it strikes me that so many people are so invested in this team because, even though there have been a lot of people who've played the game before them, the values are the same, and what the team stands for.
"They want people to feel part of it. The crowd and all of that contributed to the success of the Matildas, and that's because of all the hard work of players who've gone before and those who continue to play now, and how they connect with people."
Forman returned to Denmark and has remained there until today. She retired from the Matildas in 2002, but in hindsight, she's realised just how special the Sydney 2000 Olympics were in changing the public perception of the team and of the women's game.
"I remember playing the Women's World Cup in 1995 and in 1999, and the Olympics, and at the time, you're thinking it's just another tournament and just another game; that's the concept you have in your head," she said.
"But then when you get older and you're not playing anymore, you look back and you understand the legacy you've left. You know how much it really meant. But you didn't really take it in at that time.
"Looking back, I'm absolutely honoured to have played in two World Cups and then captained the team at the Olympics. Looking forward, I can only imagine being on the team today and the difference in the professionalism, the way they travel to games, the media coverage, all that stuff. It must be an amazing feeling.
"But I wouldn't change my days. We were the pioneers. We had some really good times. And we did make history."
As for Hughes, she remembers one particular moment that made her feel like the Matildas had achieved something special. Towards the end of the Games, she was stopped by a man and a young boy on the street.
"He was like, 'Sunni!' And I thought to myself, 'oh, it must be someone I know, obviously,' because I didn't recognise him," she said.
"But then he asked, 'can we get your autograph?'
"That had never happened to me before. The only thing I'd ever signed was that calendar.
"That one sticks in my head because it was a guy and his son, you know? We'd come through that era of nobody really recognising the value of the women's game. So to have that happen was... pretty cool."
- The Matildas play Zambia at 3am on Monday morning. Follow live with Samantha Lewis at abc.net.au/sport.