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Ange Postecoglou was disappointed the Socceroos couldn’t get one over their old foe England on Friday night but pleased he could expose plenty of youngsters to top-level opposition with World Cup qualifiers looming.
Australia were beaten 2-1 thanks to goals from England debutant Marcus Rashford and captain Wayne Rooney, but the home side certainly didn’t have everything their own way at a sold-out Stadium Of Light in Sunderland.
Australia bossed the midfield for large parts of the game and set up a tense final 15 minutes after Eric Dier headed a sizzling Milos Degenek cross into his own goal.
The performance was made even more impressive by the fact Australia were missing three front-liners in Tim Cahill, Trent Sainsbury and Matthew Spiranovic.
“It could’ve been very easy for us to go out there today and just try and snatch a result, sit back, try and absorb some pressure and try and get them on the break,” Postecoglou said.
“We kind of flipped it and went the other way. From that perspective I think everyone contributed.
“We just lacked that clinical edge in the end.”
The Socceroos were slick in patches, with Celtic’s Tom Rogic, Aaron Mooy and Mark Milligan standing tall but couldn’t lift Australia to a repeat of the shock win over England when the two sides last met in 2003, a 3-1 win at Upton Park.
Looking ahead to two friendlies next month against Greece and then World Cup qualifiers from September, Postecoglou was pleased with the outing.
“Our style of game I know will hold up for the challenges ahead, it held up against a very good opponent who are on the eve of a major tournament,” Postecoglou said.
“They’re in great physical condition, we’re kind of at the other end of the scale.
“We didn’t win the game and that’s disappointing but if we had have won the game and not played like that then I wouldn’t be any more satisfied.”
Rashford scored just 135 seconds into his debut after playing a ball to Raheem Sterling whose cross back into the box took a deflection and fell back to the 18-year-old who slotted past Mathew Ryan.
England coach Roy Hodgson introduced captain Wayne Rooney at halftime and 10 minutes later he had a goal after finishing superbly from an England counter.
Diers own goal on 75 minutes halved the deficit but Australia couldn’t quite find the equaliser.
Brisbane Roar striker Jamie Maclaren and Germany-based defender Degenek were handed debuts while Chris Ikonomidis, Matt McKay, Tomi Juric, Craig Goodwin and Jackson Irvine got exposure off the bench.
“From our perspective we had some objectives coming into the game, we really wanted to expose some of our players to a high level of football,” said Postecoglou.
“We wanted to test out our brand of football against a quality opponent, we ticked all of those boxes and in many respects we came out on the positive side of the ledger.
“We’re in a results business but that’s not what drives me, what drives me is that we continue to improve our football and play a type of game that’s going to be effective when the meaningful games come along.”
Hodgson was happy with the hit-out ahead of naming his 23-man European Championships squad.
“I thought we were correct in choosing Turkey and Australia as opponents because the quality of their play is of Euro 2016 standard,” Hodgson said.
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