On Tuesday, Sam Kerr was found not guilty of racially aggravated harassment of a police officer, bringing to an end a two-year-long saga.
However, for Kerr and for Australian football, there are still a few loose ends that will need to be tied up.
The jury may have been unanimous in its decision to let the 31-year-old walk free, but the court of public opinion has arguably never been more divided on the matter.
This incident occurred in a timeline where information came out in due course, but judgements were made hastily; social media demands hot takes, and the public obliged. Even when new pieces of information came to light, both before and during the trial, people's opinions were more often than not set in stone from that first morsel of information back in 2024: Kerr was charged with racially abusing a police officer.
Following the verdict, Kerr released a statement.
"I can finally put this challenging period behind me," she said.
"While I apologise for expressing myself poorly on what was a traumatic evening, I have always maintained that I did not intend to insult or harm anyone and I am thankful the jury unanimously agreed."
While this chapter has legally concluded, it feels like the fallout is far from done.
Personally, Kerr has a lot of exciting things on the horizon. As revealed in court, she and partner Kristie Mewis will welcome their first child in May before getting married in December.
She is also inching ever closer to a return to the pitch for both Chelsea and the Matildas after not playing for either team since rupturing her ACL at a January training camp in 2024.
Her return to Chelsea will be influenced by how well the team has done in her absence. In the 2024-25 season, Chelsea are undefeated in the Women's Super League and still alive in the League Cup, FA Cup and Champions League. There is no doubt Blues boss Sonia Bompastor will welcome the chance to use another attacking weapon in the club's quest for trophies, but Chelsea have shown they can find the back of the net without Kerr.
However, her return to the Matildas poses bigger questions. But not in a footballing sense; her gradual reintegration will be welcome, and the nation's all-time leading goal scorer will be firmly focused on getting herself right to help the team as it looks to win the Asian Cup on home soil in 2026.
For the Matildas' core group of players, this Asian Cup looms as their final crack at winning a piece of silverware; a physical thing they can grasp to go along with all of the good that has been done by the team, particularly through that 2023 World Cup run.
It's a tournament that becomes all the more important when you look at their last campaign -- a disappointing quarterfinal exit at the hands of South Korea -- and the fact it has been 15 years since Australia hoisted the Women's Asian Cup.
But Kerr's return has posed the question: will she still be the Matildas captain?
We will have to wait a few months to find out Football Australia's official position on this. Kerr is expected to return to the national team fold in April when the Matildas take on South Korea in two friendlies in New South Wales. In a statement on Tuesday, the governing body said:
"Sam has been a key figure in Australian football for many years, and we recognise the significant pressures that this matter has brought to Sam, Kristie, her family, and everyone involved, including the impact it's had on the game.
"Throughout this period, Football Australia has remained committed to supporting Sam and will continue to do so as she focuses on her footballing career, rehabilitation from injury and return to play.
"Football Australia invests heavily in building the behavioural standards and expectations of all involved with our game, especially for all our national team players, where leadership comes with added responsibilities on and off the field.
"Football Australia will reflect with Sam on learnings from this matter and we will continue to provide appropriate support for her moving forward."
The federation's point about leadership coming with added responsibilities on and off the field is the crux of the captaincy conundrum. How the incident is viewed, through the lens of Kerr being the leader of one of Australia's most beloved sporting teams, ultimately reveals people's stance on her retaining the armband.
Down one end of the spectrum: she is a racist against white people, no matter what a jury of her peers says. She acted in a way unbefitting of a woman in sports who is meant to be a role model. She should never be allowed to wear the captain's armband again and has permanently damaged her reputation and the reputation of the national team by extension.
Down the other end of the spectrum, it is equally definitive: of course Kerr should remain captain, so long as she has the support of her teammates and Football Australia, because she was found not guilty. Moreover, she was subjected to a trial that never should have been brought before the courts and was forced to defend herself against accusations of "reverse racism" and explain her actions as a woman of colour in a situation where she felt she and her partner were genuinely in danger and she personally was treated differently because of the colour of her skin.
Kerr by no means acted perfectly, but a look at other sports stars scandals and errors should put this whole incident into perspective.
Is a poorly formed thought on white privilege equivalent to cheating? Or doping? Or worse?
Those who argue that the Matildas brand is under existential threat because of Kerr's actions fail to acknowledge the Matildas no longer exist in a small pond where the average punter can name only one player.
Football Australia's decision may well come down to what kind of pushback they are willing to cop because there will be complaints if she retains the captaincy and there will be complaints if she is stripped of the armband. Then there's the footballing aspect of it all. Might Australia be a better team with Kerr as player and squad member rather than captain? Have the Matildas been better with Steph Catley wearing the armband as stand-in skipper?
The sad thing is despite the not guilty verdict, the unjust "racist" label will follow Kerr around for the rest of her career, and likely long after. Falsehoods will abound because someone "saw it on a TikTok" or "read it in a Facebook comment section."
Kerr has said she will move on, but can everybody else?