What's your assessment of the US game?
I haven't been willing to rewatch the first half again. Too depressing!
However, I've now finished the second half against USA and think Aus was clearly the better team in that half. Even though the ref tried valiantly to ensure USA were not penalised by the Aus resurgence.
At the time it may have been close to the best team Aus put out in the WC - Bos played Left WB, we still had Italiano as RWB, and Volpato played his first WC minutes. We lost Italiano shortly after this game, and Bos couldn't play the last 45 mins and ET against Egypt.
After 2 others have mooted Villupillay as a WB, and Grazor has sagely suggested Metcalfe as a WB, not sure why Popa hadn't played them earlier in friendlies? On paper they have the skill set to succeed as WBs. They could have been better than Trewin ( not defensively) and Behich, but we will never know?
After being overly harsh on Volpato's decision-making, just a few times, he really made a difference when looking again at the US second half. So often if given the ball, he was able to turn and move forwards, plus beat players, in confined spaces. I didn't care much about Triantis and Segecic not committing to Aus, but Volpato offers something different. He is a huge asset for Aus.
When Volpato was on the pitch, it didn't take long for him to draw multiple defenders, because of his dribbling ability. Unfortunately, it showed up Metcalfe's inability to do the same. Only 1 American needed to close down Metcalfe, whilst Volpato drew more defenders from then on as soon as he was on the ball - in the next games too. The attention to Volpato created space for other Roo attacking players to exploit.
Moreover, Volpato is a goalscoring threat shooting from range as well.
The ref stopped a pen for Irankunda, which IMO most refs would have awarded. I think sadly it is human nature that most refs are more timid awarding big decisions to home teams/higher ranked teams in WCs. The ref also made a lot of other mistakes in the second half - all favouring the USA. The dyed blond American LB could have been sent off for accruing 2 yellows, the second not awarded.
Obviously everything worked out for the USA in the first half - the game plan of intensive Squeezing in our defensive half and their execution of the plan. The US defenders were more alert to Aus's dangerous accelerated attacks than Turkey's defensive line.
In the second half the Squeezing intensity dropped from the USA. Aus had more ball and was able to build up more easily. We also had some decent chances to score, but like everybody probably reading this, I was surprised that Popa played Irank as target striker in a central position?
Can't remember if Geria came as a Sub against USA? He had a very good second half. The back three were pretty compact and solid in that half.
I think it was Punchanello who thought Aus had 2 good halves out of 8 played. I beg to differ. Obviously the first half against USA was a shocker. Plus we were disappointing in Extra Time against Egypt.
IMO all other 7 halves ( only have the second quarter to watch against Egypt), were quite decent given the calibre of the teams we faced. The most disappointing thing was that after the first 2 halves in ordinary time, Egypt were the better team in Extra Time. Even if we lost the pen shoot out, we surprisingly faded in Extra Time compared to Egypt.
We wasted best opportunity to advance to the second knockout round in a WC, as Argentina 2022 and Italy ( 10 men) in 2006, were too good for Aus. Egypt weren't.
