Australian rugby sevens captain Charlotte Caslick has quickly deleted a social media post showing her partying at a nightclub just hours after her team suffered a heartbreaking last-second defeat that robbed them of a medal.
A tearful Caslick was left wondering what went wrong when the team lost its semifinal to Canada on Tuesday and then watched the United States score at the last possible moment to steal bronze and leave the players in uncontrollable tears.
However, on Wednesday she posted a picture showing her partying at a nightclub surrounded by a group of men accompanied by the message “4th in the standings but always first in the standings” in reference to the team’s fourth-place finish on the field at the Olympics.
The post was only up for a short time before the 29-year-old, who was awarded the Medal of the Order of Australia for services to sport in 2017, deleted it.
Caslick had previously posted photos of the loss alongside the caption: “Heartbroken and very sorry but forever proud to represent Australia with these girls.”
The recent world series champions and Rio Olympic gold medallists had made steady progress into Tuesday’s semi-finals and looked set for a showdown with Tokyo title winners New Zealand.
But on a day when temperatures reached 30 degrees, a moment of distraction changed the course of his entire campaign.
Canada’s Charity Williams played the villain, catching the Australian defence by surprise and racing in to score a surprise try that sparked one of the biggest upsets of the Games.
Australian rugby sevens captain Charlotte Caslick posted (and then quickly deleted) this shocking Instagram post just hours after her teammates were left absolutely devastated in Paris.
The soccer star is pictured seconds after his team lost to the United States in the last second, robbing them of a bronze medal.
Leading 12-0, Australia never recovered and the 21-12 loss relegated the shell-shocked team to a bronze medal battle with the United States less than three hours later.
Australia again scored first before conceding and, at 7-7, were hammering the United States line in the final 90 seconds before a try – Maddison Levi’s second and the 14th, an Olympic record for the tournament – looked to have sealed a consolation medal.
But out of nowhere Alex Sedrick avoided a tackle and ran 85 metres, converting his own try to spark wild scenes and bring more misery to Tim Walsh’s side.
The United States had beaten Australia in the group stage in Tokyo, and Caslick’s team also missed out on medals there when it was upset by Fiji in the quarterfinals.
But this one, after such a dominant tournament and a brilliant start, was particularly painful.
“I feel pretty devastated,” Caslick said.
Australian rugby stars in tears over shock defeat to Americans
Pictured: The Australian stars are consoled by members of the crowd after going from being one of the favourites to take home the gold to leaving Paris empty-handed.
‘That’s the beauty of sevens and the sport; that’s why we play it.
‘It’s a game of moments and there are probably some things we would have liked to do differently, but we can’t take them back.
“It sucks, obviously. We want to go home with a medal. We are the ones who train every day to have this feeling.”
His campaign slogan was “no regrets” and coach Tim Walsh insisted there were none left, describing it as “cruel” to label fourth place a failure.
“Success and disaster are both impostors and must be treated in the same way,” Walsh said, paraphrasing Rudyard Kipling’s poem “If.”
Walsh, who is out of contract and considering whether to continue in the role, agreed that the half-time try against Canada had been a pivotal moment in his campaign.
“Winning and learning… a little bit of winning and a little bit of learning,” he reflected.
“I would have liked us to win a bit more and it would have been a better end to the season.”
New Zealand then rubbed salt in the wound, rallying from a 12-7 deficit to win the gold medal match 19-12 and defend their title.