to qualify for next years Asian Cup that is A pleasing result for us and it leaves Bahrain and Kuwait to battle it out for second spot.
i'd prefer bahrain to finish second.. atleast they actually try to play and dont put all their players behind the ball
Its because lebanon withdrew. But even if lebanon played u guys would have qualified. But anyways congrats. I just hope your european players play in asian cup so that there won't be no excuses from u guys .
we wont have excuses anyway.. and no, most of them wont play, they will only play in the final if we happen to make it which is pretty unlikely
I mean ur B team playing all of the asian cup matches and your european players playing the asian cup final. I think its unfair to the B team.......... what say?
it will be a mixture of the c team players that played today and some of the b team players in europe like beauchamp, heffernan.. maybe kennedy and david williams aswell.. maybe some of the a-team players like kewell could play in the quarters or something if we make it that far. the c-team players are aware of their role, they know they are in because the others arent available
Huh? pretty much most of them have said they want to play in the asian cup, its just the qualifiers against smaller opponents on non fifa sanctioned dates that has detered them this time, although I believe I heard something about lucas and a few others coming for the home Bahrain game. And at worst we put out our B team of second teir european players in instead of the C team we trotted out there tonight.
If the european based players dont have matches when asian cup resumes, i hope they play in the asian cup.
yeah thats basically what im saaying.. when euro player arent available the c players will play. the euro players will be there on uefa dates though
This makes no sense. They'd have to be picked in the Squad for the whole of the finals to play in the Final Final. Not many A-squad players will be in the last two qualifiers (although a few should turn out in Kuwait) but a few will be back for the Asian Cup - particularly those who might not feel they would make WC2010 due to their age. As to whether we'd win the Asian Cup - we'll give it a shake, but I wouldn't make us favourites or anything. J
Humph. I think he meant to say that it would be unexcusable if the Socceroos didn't field their strongest side in the Asian Cup Finals next year. (I think.) Don't worry sakbekham, we plan to launch all the big guns in '07. We're Australia, man. We never back down from a challenge.
As long as the games fall on international fifa dates, i.e 4 days either side of the fixture they will come. Australia will be fielding a full strength side for the Bahrain second leg in Sydney. With Lucas Neill, Cahill etc etc allready stating that they have this one penciled in. As far as the finals of the Asian cup, id hope that Arnold would include some of these younger b team players from Europe, like Thwaite, Beauchamp, Heffernan etc, as these players realistically arnt far off getting in the "best" team. If we have a team, ala the team we played Jamaica with, id still be fairly confident of a good result against most of the early stages in the finals
You do realise its a proper tournament like the World Cup & Euro Cup?? Ie -this is qualification for the FINALS...... And the team for the finals- like the World Cup is locked in- so I think that the best team will be picked.
bravo bravo, did that make you feel big? i was just trying to speak normal and i was obviously wrong.. no need to pounce on me and try to get the moral highground while im down
Bah, Bahrain are shit. I root against them everytime now for that shit against Uzbeks Down with bahrain!
If they have club commitments so be it.This was always going to be an issue from day one.Its not just availability its also travel, time away, injury management.No matter how good our physio's and doctors are, the clubs would be against it more often than not.Its ok for countries like Korea, Iran and Japan who only have a sprinkling of euro based players, our entire first team squad is.Teams like Saudi Arabia none.If they can get back for some important matches, well and good.But the majority of the top top liners are not going to be getting back for every single game as the qualification path goes on.FIFA dates taken into account or not.
They wont have club committments for finals as they fall in the FIFA window for continental championships. There is a problem with qualifiers due to the timing of the tournament. There aren't enough official qualifier dates set aside to complete the qualifiers in a World Cup year so that the tournament finals can be organised for the next year. We (Australia) will struggle with home games on friendly dates as they are usually just a single day mid week with 48 hours release time. Its not enough time for a player to travel from Europe and get back in time for a club match the next weekend. Thats why we play friendlies in Europe. The official qualifier dates are usually a double date and have a bit more release time. Players can more feasibly travel and return with sufficient recovery time. Unfortunately those dates are set up for UEFA qualifiers, and anyone that doesn't follow that timetable will struggle. What it means is that our home based and fringe players will get some valuable experience in international competition on the friendly dates when we play a qualifier. We will probably have two squads for a while with some intermingling between them before they combine for Asian Cup finals and World Cup qualifiers.
Mod's Note... Guys, let's conduct this discussion without insulting and attacking one another please. If you can't chat in a civil manner, just don't post anything at all.
Re: Humph. shame the lebs pulled out. I would liked to of seen some more Aussie matches over the year. play friendlies instead i say
Bahrain isn't that good. However I don't rate Australia high either because they lost to Kuwait by 2 to nul.
Re: Humph. I meant to say that if you guys don't win the asian cup 2007 with your B, C players; tHEn u guys will be making up excuses that ur european players did not play. I am not worrying, its u guys who has to worry after that kuwait's loss.