Re: Official Socceroos Thread

[The Sanchez]

World Cup squad gets announced tomorrow! Alot of players injured like Williams, Kruse, Sainsbury, Good even Jedi coped a knock on the weekend though excited in which players Ange picks!

[BarcaKizz]

Final 23 named and we're basically the most inexperienced team at the WC.

Here's something I drew up.



Taggart makes the final cut.

Our defence is extremely worrying... they've still never really played together and surprised Wilkshire was left out leaving only 6 specialist defenders.

I guess we will see who our first XI is against Croatia in the friendly. The key battles for me are CB (McGowan, Wright, Wilkinson) and #10 (Troisi, Vidosic, or play a 3 man DM/CM with Holland and Milligan next to Jedinak).

I assume...

Ryan
Franjic McGowan Spiranovic Davidson
Jedinak Milligan
Leckie Vidosic Oar
Cahill

Not 100% sure about McGowan there... and I don't really rate Milligan as our deep-lying passer.

Wilkinson is garbage.. but hard to call upon Wright...who's never even been in the squad before and is 21.

I do like the look of Halloran, we should use him off the bench. Would also like to see Luongo.

We're in a horrible situation...

[Forza]

Yeah, it's not a great team and I'd really rather we parked the bus instead of exposing ourselves against Spain, the Netherlands & Chile.

[fatman123]

Everytime i read Ange or one of the players saying they want to play positive football at the WC i cringe. Although it is brave of them, if they try to play out against any of these teams (in particular Spain) we'll play into their hands and the scoreline could be ugly.

It might not be pretty to watch, but Australia needs to go ultra mourinho and park a bus infront of their plane

[BarcaKizz]

I don't think we should go full on Chelsea on them. I don't think we're capable of it. Our back 4 has basically never played together and basically never played against the sort of quality we'll face. If we sit back and sit deep they will flog us. We need to get up in their faces and try to win the ball in midfield. What we do have are a lot of energetic attackers and good ball-winners.

We need to upset their buildup play and try and be smart on the ball when we get it. Our defence is simply not good enough to sit back.

Also, its not like they're going to go gun-ho and leave loads of space. They are just saying positive things because they need to create a positive atmosphere. Given our sporting culture if they said anything less than "we'll have a go", they'd be crucified and told they were given up.

I don't think we'll play stupid, we'll be set up in a manner that gives us every chance. Let's hope we can do a decent job.

Starting XI:

Rumours picking up that Halloran could be pretty important for Ange, though maybe only off the bench.

It seems the 3 AMs are the question marks... Normally we'd have Kruse, Rogic and Oar, but with 2 out its a difficult one.

Seems Bresch could be playing centrally. Oar could be there as well and then there is Vidosic and Troisi.

It'll be interesting, but I'm not opposed to Bresciano playing in there due to his experience. Particularly against Spain I would play him there.

[fatman123]

Looking back this is quite ironic

[The Sanchez]

Alot of positives we can get out of this World Cup!
Considering Ange has only had 5 games in the job and we could have possibly got points in our first two matches against three quality world class teams shows how great a job he has done so far.
Ange went with our strengths and has hugely improved our weakness (defense). He made some tough decisions but the right decisions in terms of the building steps for the future.
Gonners for the World Cup in 2018: Cahill, Bresciano, Kennedy, McKay (who was utter crap)
So we need to find alternatives to replace these players. Cross the ball into Cahill was basically our only was to score. We don't seem to have any other goalscores apart from him which will be a worry when he is gone. Maybe Kennedy will fill in but don't think he will be there for 2018. Bresciano is a big loss in terms of composure in midfield and creativity but he doesn't the energy to last a full 90 minutes. Time for guys like Rogic, Amini and De Silva to all step up.
Overall good signs.

[Kick]

Mark Bresciano has retired from international duty.

[Forza]

Bresciano was a great player and the unsung hero of the team that made it to the 2006 World Cup. I'm glad that Luongo has stepped up to replace him just in time.

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