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Socceroos vs Egypt - 2026 World Cup R32 - Sat 4th of July 4am AEST

derider said:
I don’t think Egypt is more talented at all. Most of their players play in their domestic league and Salah is past it.

I also don’t think USA have a particularly great squad. They’re just playing at home and have a good coach. I certainly don’t think they are miles ahead of us as a team.
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In terms of cohesion and fluid play the US is a long way ahead of us.

They play like a stable team with developed combinations and they execute them well.

Our play is disjointed and we play like the team we are - different players every game 'but they all know the system' so they are expected to gel.

As you say, playing Toure out of position means playing him without the support of decent attacking threats on either side of him. He is also played out of position because he is made into an isolated striker with random balls delivered somewhere near him from time to time.

We do not have the pointy stick striker in our squad to play up front and just beat a couple of players and score.

We need space for our strikers to run into, or we need wider players to draw the defence out of their comfortable positions and deliver a good cross.

Popa's playbook says 5-4 and the forward is meant to construct something as the 1 up front.

Playing positive football in the first half forces our opponents to hold 3 or more players back. Playing Popa first halves allows every opposition player to actively take part in the development of attacks. And at the world class level that is enough for any team to eventually score against us.

Under Popa we have no attacking threat unless he accidentally puts a target man up front, players like Irankunda outside him, and instructs the team to apply higher pressure across the whole front. He has accidentally done that once against Turkey and learnt how to avoid it in subsequent games.

Popa takes the heart out of our attacking options and instils cowardice throughout.
 
Hillbilly55 said:
Such an insipid performance by us. I had been supportive of Poppa, but that has just killed any enthusiasm for the Asian Cup if he is still in charge. Going on personnel, we should be favourites, and certainly make the Final.
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That's all Asian teams out right, we were the last one?
 
Hillbilly55 said:
Such an insipid performance by us. I had been supportive of Poppa, but that has just killed any enthusiasm for the Asian Cup if he is still in charge. Going on personnel, we should be favourites, and certainly make the Final.
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Japan will be the runaway favourites. If the last 2 are any indication, a petro state will probably win it. We’ll be out in the quarters or semis.

…and it won’t matter. This world cup has exposed Asia as a mickey mouse confederation. The standard is so embarrassingly low that it will be hard to care even if we do well.
 
theFOOTBALLlover said:
What player?
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Haissem Hassan. He played in the u17 World Cup for France and so would have required a change of association, but none was registered on the FIFA portal. There's a Football360 article about it (which some Egyptians appear to have found, if you look at the comments): https://football360.com.au/haissem-hassan-egypt-winger-world-cup-news/

My understanding is that, under the FIFA rules, Egypt would forfeit the game 3-0. There might be an obvious explanation but it's not immediately obvious what that might be at this stage.

I wonder if our resident expert JRVK thinks about it (if he's still around)?
 
Hounddog said:
Perhaps, but I didn't see a good option to start at striker instead of Irankunda. If we had that player, things would have been better, the guys that came off the bench didn't look like that player.

IMO a different coach would get similar results, except for Ange.

With Ange, results could have been a lot better, or a lot worse.

With enough talent all coaches look good, and without the talent all coaches look bad.

Sometimes a coach who is prepared to take more risks gets more rewards, and sometimes the high risk strategy blows up badly.
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This new lot could have done alright under him I think but there's no chance now, those bridges have been burnt. Maybe Muscat can be convinced, or Milligan with a few more seasons under the belt?
I'd like to play a less pragmatic game and these two coaches seem to be the goods in that regard imho.

Beach
Italiano Cercati Soutar Bos
O'Neil
Okon Metcalf
Volpato Toure Irankunda
 
derider said:
I don’t think Egypt is more talented at all. Most of their players play in their domestic league and Salah is past it.

I also don’t think USA have a particularly great squad. They’re just playing at home and have a good coach. I certainly don’t think they are miles ahead of us as a team.
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Look at a list of the US players and their clubs. It looks like our golden gen, each player at a top league or at a champions league club from a B tier league. They are ahead of us in terms of squad.
 
Encomium said:
This new lot could have done alright under him I think but there's no chance now, those bridges have been burnt. Maybe Muscat can be convinced, or Milligan with a few more seasons under the belt?
I'd like to play a less pragmatic game and these two coaches seem to be the goods in that regard imho.

Beach
Italiano Cercati Soutar Bos
O'Neil
Okon Metcalf
Volpato Toure Irankunda
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Just based off Milligans comments alone.

I'd be willing to listen to why Milligan should be coach. I want an open-minded coach who isn't stubborn and is forcing a system that doesn't suit our players. It should be the system to fit our players not the players trying to fit into the coaches system. How we play now, is an continuous losing assembly line. With correct selections, correct scouting, correct lineups, correct formations and correct players we can be better than we are right now.
 
Alright, hindsight is 20/20 but some things stuck out
*Ref let the game get out of control. Bos looks badly hurt because players thought they could get away with wild tackles. Hope he is alright because he has been awesome
*Poppa lost it. After the turkiye game the whole world saw the threat nestory could be so double teamed him as a sole striker and he did next to nothing since then
*Volparto getting subbed? Why? He was one of the few with spark
*Dead balls/corners? I've seen better from way lower ranked teams than us. What's going on. It's been a theme all WC
*Striker issues. Nestory isn't a natural 9, obviously. Toure seemed lackluster, his off the ball running average his defensive tracking back not up to a do or die match. Injured? Need a viduka who can receive and hold and play nestory, volps, Metcalfe, Irvine or even behich in for a strike. We have mids who can score, but if they are all back defending like CBs cause of poppaball then we need better possession retention.
*Behich had a better game for sure. Credit to him
*Poppaball. Look I've got a similar problem with him as I did Ange. So wedded to a system that they are unable to mix it up. Defend off the ball in depth makes it hard to score, unless we can produce a Harling somehow. We need a smarter coach who can tika taka like Ange, but then when needed isn't going to consider counter attacking some kind of heresy. I've found him dour and conservative and so don't mind if we change. We've got some players who knows how to attack, so need a coach that suits that.
*Okon said something that made me wonder if they are coaching by stats. Like, I don't care how many completed passes you have, if it means the other team can track back and stuff the attack and we go nowhere. Egypt showed great counterattacks with balls over the top we couldn't do ourselves
*Trewin added little, sorry. As did Ryan
*Penalties are a tough way to go out. No shame on the takers, any of them. Poppa must have(?) been drilling Ryan on penalties I don't know as otherwise why change from beach.
*Soutar and Herrington are a good combo, of course not perfect but still they calm my nerves
*Depth was an issue. So why pick Leckie to go to the WC? Sorry. Only got so many spots so using one for a guy older than Tommy Oar seemed odd
 
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