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Like all Australian football fans I stayed up on Tuesday night expecting a routine performance from my beloved Socceroos.
Our strongest starting XI away to Thailand. That screams control and composure but instead it brought disorganisation and despair.
I had to go to sleep that early Wednesday morning with a long school day ahead of me, pondering frustratingly “How did we let this happen? A 2-2 draw in Bangkok?” I don’t think I was the only one that laid in my bed that Tuesday night and couldn’t help but fear the worst, and to be completely honest, it brought a tear to my eye, imagining us absent from the World Cup in Russia.
So much so that a Twitter rant simply wasn’t enough to show my frustration and disappointment with this team that looked completely dejected, complacent and overall, shameful.
So where do we start. Like many would say, saying that your goalkeeper was the best on the park is not a good thing. For a side coached by Ange Postecoglou, his reliability on his marauding fullbacks, he’s got a concerning selection process. Brad Smith is a decent option, like Alex Gersbach, in defence, he needs some work, but going forward he is average.
You might be thinking, just average? He isn’t up to scratch. Perhaps two out of six crosses in a match will actually hit the head of an Aussie and even then it’s not on target or it sprays over the other side for Robbie Kruse or Aaron Mooy to collect.
Smith is learning obviously but I feel he has gone long enough under the protection of being ‘the new boy blooded in’. He needs to shape it up before the long line of backups we have start yanking on his shirt.
The same can be said about our right fullback in Milos Degenek. Saying this selection concerns me is a dramatic understatement to the point where in fact it angers me. Since Degenek’s last Socceroos camp (the matches for Saudi Arabia and Japan in October) he sustained an injury keeping him out for three matches and before the Thailand match he only had 45 minutes of football in him, playing as a No.6.
Putting it plain and simple, Degenek is about as natural as a fullback as wearing a Versace suit to the 7/11. Anyone with a football brain could tell that in that match, he struggled, you could tell in the first five minutes of the second half that this was not going to end well when he was cornered not once but twice in two minutes in his own half.
Mark Rudan referred to it in the preview of the match as a ‘problem position’ and went about it suggesting Rhyan Grant in the squad, Rhyan Grant? What irritates me is the inability for pundits and fans to be able to criticise their own players and instead suggest easier solutions like a player who has played six good A-League games.
The solution to this problem, is on the bench! Josh Risdon is the only natural right back in the squad and for some reason he is left on the bench. Why risk honing in on Degenek to keep him ‘Aussie’ in an unnatural position?
The obvious starting player has triple the amount of first grade games and has played right back his whole career. I believe we should be keeping players like Smith and Degenek and keeping them involved in Australian football but when it comes at the price of making the World Cup then it prompts the thought of their use altogether in this campaign.
Aaron Mooy, Matthew Leckie and Tom Rogic are a different story however. Yes they were quite off the pace and inconsistent but we didn’t get control of the game, that is the environment that they thrive in and the entire second half we were outplayed.
Mooy, Leckie and Rogic are safe and there is hardly any criticism rather than a poor run of form. The same can’t be said for Robbie Kruse though.
From the get-go he looked unmotivated and showed little interest with his movement and runs as well as being caught offside in around four goal-scoring opportunities. Once again, his delivery’s were shocking, at points in the first half, not even raising his head to pick out a man and with almost every move he made down the right, it ended in a corner.
His rawness from club football is transferring to the national team, it never sued to, but it’s finally catching up to him. Four out of the 20 appearances he has made since the World Cup campaign started against Kyrgyzstan have been starts for Leverkusen. If Postecoglou’s philosophy is ‘play and play well’ at each of their clubs, then what is Kruse doing in the squad let alone in the starting XI?
Even worse is the incapability once again of pundits criticising our players. During the first and second half I heard Andy Harper say “He’s looked alright tonight Robbie Kruse, been on his toes”, that is ridiculous commentary, being on your toes means nothing if your final ball is useless, you’re offside half the time we are attacking and lose the ball in midfield countless times.
Yes Robbie Kruse is a big player, doesn’t mean I am afraid to say he is not at his best and he does not to deserve to be in that starting XI, hasn’t deserved it for some time and if he continues to put performances in like that, our chances of getting on the big stage get slimmer and slimmer.
The performance on Tuesday was appalling; there is no doubt about it. The next step here is making sure we do not drop points against Iraq since UAE are now level on points with us, it’s almost a four-horse race, this road to Russia is long and the potholes will keep emerging in its aftermath if we don’t fix it soon.
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