Some people said “Holger who” after that famous press announcement of the new Socceroos coach a few weeks back. The only Holger I really knew before then was Holger Brockman, the smooth voiced radio announcer who plays my kind of rock and jazz music.
Since then Holger Osieck and his thrown together Socceroos outfit have got a couple of creditable results and the future ahead under Holger seems to be brighter than we first thought. I’m even getting excited about our chances to win our first ever men’s senior Asian Cup in January.
No more backpage headlines about the boring coach’s tactics or the “creditable defensive effort”.
There’s talk now about the results and about how the Aussies are playing more of their natural aggressive attacking style and not about the coach and his opinions about the “hopeless” A-League. Even Brett Holman is looking very good and gets better with every game.
After a creditable draw against Switzerland over the weekend, the Socceroos “heroes” beat Poland 2-1 in a football friendly match in Krakow last night.
Australia scored goals by Brett Holman (13min) and Luke Wilkshire (26 – pen.) with rising Polish star Robert Lewandowski netting one for Poland (18).
Poland could not press a one man advantage in the second half following Brett Emerton seeing a red card produced from the referee’s pocket. Adam Federici also played his part by saving a penalty.
In preparation leading up to the Asian Cup, Osieck should walk away happy with Australia’s first two matches under his charge, a draw with world No.17 Switzerland and a morale boosting triumph at Poland.
Australia still has a lot of work to do, by Holger’s own admission and has two more friendlies to play before Holger decides on the make-up of his squad for January’s Asian Cup in Qatar, against Paraguay in Sydney next month before an expected fixture in Egypt in November.
Tongue in cheek, I’d also like to hail Holger as Australia’s greatest ever senior men’s national football team manager, having never lost a game in charge of the Socceroos.
Long may that rich vein of form continue!
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