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Socceroos caretaker coach Han Berger has challenged Australia’s next generation of footballers to prove themselves worthy in next week’s friendly against Slovenia.
In the Socceroos’ first appearance since the World Cup in South Africa, Berger has named a squad with a mixture of established and unproven players for Wednesday’s (Thursday AM AEST) fixture in Ljubljana.
While the squad includes captain Lucas Neill, Tim Cahill and Mark Schwarzer, big names such as Harry Kewell, Brett Emerton, Vince Grella and Mark Bresciano have been left out so they can continue their pre-season preparations with their European clubs.
A-League players were also excluded from selection with the new domestic campaign getting underway on the weekend.
In their place several inexperienced or new names such as Tommy Oar, Bruce Djite, Nathan Burns and uncapped defender Shane Lowry have been given an opportunity to prove their worth as the Socceroos begin preparations for the 2011 Asia Cup and 2014 World Cup qualifiers.
“We see the friendly against Slovenia as a part of the next phase of the Socceroos campaign, which is aimed at developing the squad for the 2014 FIFA World Cup and the 2011 Asian Cup as an extremely important step along that way,” Berger told reporters on Tuesday.
“A number of players are not currently available and a number of players we discussed with them this fixture and for them we explained why we think it’s more important to consolidate their positions with the clubs.
“They missed parts of the preparation because of the World Cup and it’s also in our interest that these players will be playing on a regular basis.
“For any of the young players it’s important. Opposed to other opinion I think we have a number of very talented players but in order to become a good player you need to gain experience and you can only gain experience by playing.”
Oar, who enjoyed a breakthrough season with the Brisbane Roar that resulted in a debut Socceroos cap, a move to Holland and a spot in Australia’s preliminary World Cup squad, said the time was now for he and his fellow young guns to grasp the nettle.
“Of course. Obviously we’ve got a changing of the guard, you could say, with the Socceroos and a number of retirees and things like that,” Oar said.
“I think in the next six months or so there’ll be a lot of important games where everyone can show what they’re worth.”
With neither Bresciano or Kewell in the squad, a starting position beckons for left-sided winger Oar but he wasn’t taking anything for granted.
“Obviously a start would be fantastic, I’m not going to get my hopes up by any means yet,” he said.
“I’ll have to go into the camp and see what way the coach wants to play but, yeah, to get a starting spot would be a great opportunity and something I’d be looking to take with both hands.”
Berger said he had no interest in taking over the coaching role full-time despite the result against Slovenia and he expected the Socceroos new coach to be named in the “near future”.
Australia squad: Nathan Burns, Tim Cahill, David Carney, Bruce Djite, Adam Federici, Richard Garcia, James Holland, Brett Holman, Mile Jedinak, Shane Lowry, Mark Milligan, Jon McKain, Lucas Neill, Jade North, Thomas Oar, Nikita Rukavytsya, Mark Schwarzer, Carl Valeri, Dario Vidosic, Luke Wilkshire.
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