Along with the imminent announcement on Tuesday of the 30-man preliminary squad for the Socceroos’ World Cup campaign, there has been a myriad of debate over who should and shouldn’t make the cut.
While some pleas have been in vain – Sasa Ognenovski and the like will never feature in a squad involving Pim Verbeek – the point that’s had me thinking the most this week is: how many injured players can Verbeek afford to take with him?
It’s not just the injured players who are a concern but also those who have been struggling to find game time.
It’s one thing to take 2 or 3 liabilities but any more then that and, in a 23-man squad, it shows.
Here’s my list of players who fit into the above category (let me know in the comments below if you think I’ve missed any):
Craig Moore: Hasn’t played for over a month since his departure from Greek club Kavala.
Jason Culina: Has been resigned to training in the Netherlands since Gold Coast’s season ended months ago.
Carl Valeri: Has struggled to secure a starting berth at Sassuolo but if not in first XI generally comes off the bench.
Mile Sterjovski: Been training with Blackburn and Fulham since A-League season ended.
Tommy Oar: Another A-League player who hasn’t played for months.
Richard Garcia: Inconsistent season partly due to recovery from injury. Started last two games for Hull City but hasn’t scored for over a year.
Alex Brosque: Last game was at Etihad Stadium in the A-League Grand Final.
Harry Kewell: After months out injured, came off the bench on Saturday.
Mark Bresciano: Season is over after a lower back injury has troubled him all year. Might even be a risk to make the World Cup.
Vince Grella: Missed two months of football but has made an appearance in most Blackburn games since late February.
Josh Kennedy: Another Socceroo with a back injury but is back in the Nagoya squad and scored on the weekend.
Matthew Spiranovic: Move to Urawa has seemingly backfired with ‘Spira’ being restricted to two league cup games only.
Jade North: Made huge personal and financial sacrafice to move to Norway in search of game time but has only played four times since he joined Tromso.
Simon Colosimo: Stuck training for five weeks in the Netherlands since his move to the K-League fell through.
David Carney: Is another player who couldn’t nail down a starting position since returning from injury.
Dario Vidosic: Struggled with injury following his loan move to Duisburg but has started getting some game time in recent weeks and will start the last game of the season on Sunday.
So that’s a massive 16 possible inclusions that are either not playing, sidelined or just returning from injury.
It doesn’t look good.
Six of those names (Kewell, Bresciano, Kennedy, Culina, Grella and Moore) will be going no matter what. Meaning, if Verbeek takes any of those other players lacking in game time, he would be seriously jeopardising the Socceroos’ ability to field 11 fully fit players in their regular positions.
I expect Pim’s squad to be entirely as expected.
The players who have been involved in recent squads will make up this group with only the barest of exceptions. Verbeek likes his “favourites” and at most there might be one or two surprises.
This means the Socceroos will go to South Africa with a number of players either lacking game time or still recovering form injury.
And that worries me.
Tom Findlay from The World Game argued in his blog on Thursday that: “One issue that springs to mind is how Verbeek plans to tackle Germany, which he admits has the defensive strength to nullify Australia’s preferred 4-3-2-1 formation, which is built around getting delivery to the head of tall striker Josh Kennedy.
“The presumed pickle of who should warm the bench out of Carle or Holman pales in the face of the problem of how to stop, or at least slow down, one of the world’s best football units”
But, while Findlay is right, a half-fit Socceroos team won’t be able to match Germany for a full 90 minutes no matter what the tactics.
And it’s that which has me worried.
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