Socceroos 2018 WCQ THREAD-v HONDURAS FOR SPOT IN RUSSIA (Dates TBC)

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roo2macca

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Thailand is the group whipping boy and the fact that we couldn't get full points here could be the difference between qualifying and the third round playoff against god knows who, probably some unlucky South American team.
It will be the 4th placed North American team. However, we would need to get past the 3rd placed team from the other group first (most likely Uzbekistan but still a chance it could be South Korea).
 

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FreoRicci

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Funny, watching Iraq UAE, both teams going in hard and getting back up when tackled. When they face Australia, Japan they really are a different bunch.
 

FreoRicci

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So UAE just beat Iraq 2 nil.
That now means Japan are equal first with Saudi Arabia on 10 points, ahead on goal difference. While Australia slip to 3rd with 9 points, equal with UAE in 4th. Definitely massive chance gone begging tonight..
 

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peternorth

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humidity does strange things to you. some of the challenges and attempted tackles were a smidge late, i think influenced by the humidity.
but also, yes I feel there was a sense of "expecting it to happen" which is natural.
Thais were also doing it for their late much loved King. No doubt gave them a lift.

Perhaps the boys were thinking about where to get their bintang singlets
 

Tulip

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Truth of the matter is that we're just not that good. Mooy and Rogic are a good pair, Smith and Kruse would be if they played any club football. McLaren was terrible - why was he allowed to wear Cahill's number?
 

jhong

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The only way we could of helped the opposition more was to put the ball in the net for them . Mooy was awful , just kept giving the ball away( a disease that affected the whole team tbh) , Leckie and Cruise are just dumb footballers , Ronaldo could have been our number 9 and we would of made him look shit too. Credit to the Thai's , could and should of won this , they were motivated , and their skill on the ball made us look 2nd rate. At times we looked like a wanna be Barcelona with-out the skill to do it. Also think Ange was out coached this game .
Welcome to WC football .
 

GOALden Hawk

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I can't decide who performed worse today - our midfield or our middle order batsmen :mad:

It went backwards again when Milligan had to go back to cover at centre back. He's still Australia's most underrated footballer and has to start alongside Jedinak in the double pivot role for the next game.
Spot on. Milligan has outperformed Mike for 2 years really. And we still don't have a natural finisher.

Mooy had his worst ever game in a national shirt mind you.

The game against Saudis at home will be the massive one I suspect.
 
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That was disgusting. Reckon Oikonimidis would be 1000x better than Kruse.
I'm a bit annoyed, either we put a cross in and we score from a penalty or a Cahill header or we don't score.

Either we start getting wingers who can dribble (Oikonomidis or even Burns) or we adjust to play more counter-attacking against these asian sides actually using our pacey wingers (Oar, Kruse or Leckie).
 

nobbyiscool

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Dont follow Oz squad stuff that much, but what happened to that Greek/Aussie guy we chased to play for us a while back? Wasn't he a striker?
Giannou?

He was on the bench last night - I'm sure that, coming into the game, Ange would've expected to give him some game time. But as it became obvious that we were too slow last night he had to bring on Burns for McLaren instead of Giannou.

He may still have gotten a late run but for Spiranovic's injury.
 
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