SYDNEY >> The rest of the world sees Australia as a country full of sports fanatics.

But, like just about everywhere else on the planet, there are those who would rather die than live without athletics and there are those who wonder what all the fuss is about.

You get examples of both extremes at Sydney Olympic Park in New South Wales, where the University of Hawaii football team is camped out and preparing to play its first game ever in another country here on Saturday.

A young woman tells me she is from Sydney, but remembers nothing of the 2000 Olympic Games — despite the reminders all around us. They include the huge ANZ Stadium where the UH-Cal game will be played and streets named after Aussie sports heroes such as Herb Elliott, arguably the greatest middle-distance runner of his era.

She also has no idea what “gridiron” is. When I throw out the hint of “American football” it still registers a blank.

Rafter Cheong is an employee of the Pullman Hotel, where much of the UH party is housed this week. He was born in Hong Kong but has lived in Sydney since 2004.

He also is not familiar with the term gridiron when I ask. But he’s well aware that there’s a game this weekend at the stadium just a couple of blocks down the street, and that it involves American college teams that play something very similar to what the NFL does.

Cheong’s favorite sport is soccer, but he also considers himself a big fan of the NFL — although not as much as when Jarryd Hayne from Sydney played for the 49ers last year.

Hayne, who starred with the Parramatta Eels of the Australian NRL in 2006, returned to rugby after one season with San Francisco and now plays for the Gold Coast Titans.

Talk to most sports fans here, and they’ll tell you rugby is the nation’s favorite sport. It’s followed in popularity by Australian Rules Football — which Scott Harding played as a professional before becoming one of the most versatile players in UH football history, punting, returning punts and kickoffs and catching passes from 2011 to 2014.

At the recently completed Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Australia won 29 medals, including eight golds. It is the country’s lowest medal count at the Summer Games since 1992, when it brought home 27, and the national rank of 10th also the lowest since Barcelona.

The disappointing performance has caused questioning of the millions of dollars the Australian government invests in its elite-level sports development programs.

“People say it can be spent on other things when not meeting expectations and … in Australia people are very quick to jump on them and ask why,” said Andrew Price of Melbourne, a self-described sports fanatic. “Aussies are sports mad. But in Sydney, crowds can be small for sporting events at times.”

Kim Brennan, an Australian gold medalist in single sculls at Rio, says the return on investment shouldn’t be measured in medals.

“It is a vessel that gives us something to unite in a collective,” Brennan wrote in a commentary in the Sydney Morning Herald. “Something that brings us together over the water cooler, on the train, walking the dog. Something to bring joy and hope.”

Take out the part about the train and those are words with which UH football fans who have hung tough through hard times can certainly relate … as many others have also questioned the investment.

Reach Dave Reardon at dreardon@staradvertiser.com or 529-4783. His blog is at Hawaiiwarriorworld.com/quick-reads.