High flyer Kyah! Simon has final say as Matildas salvage draw against US

Waxhead- Don't know where you got the idea that I thought a team was made up minus fullbacks. Got me puzzled. I'll try again and point out my views on the game as it is presently played by the Matildas First of all let me point out my opinion that our national teams should be exposed to many more games in front of an Australian public,55,000 attending 2 matches ,deemed friendlies, should tell our managers that this could be the best place to build a bridge in our football pyramid. Now to the games. IMO the Matildas had only 2 players in the team who could match their opponents in speed and aggression these being Carpenter and Raso. As most of the play in today's game is played in midfield it is essential that this area is peopled by players with these attributes. Van Egmond and Fowler both lack those attributes and therefore ,over 90 minutes, can be exploited by a classy opponent. So rather than say anything about fullbacks I was simply pointing out that better use could be had from these 2 players playing in midfield rather than in the different roles they are being asked to fill. Re your assertion of 11 plyers in a team I should point out that a debate on how best to prepare and use 11 players has been a subject for debate in football tactics for about the last 95 years, yes since Chapman decided to play his centre-half, a midfield position, as a center -back, a back 3 position in the Arsenal team of 1930. It would require a book to explain the changes that have been made in football tactics since those days but there are publications that will tell you the long story. Cheers jb.

@J Binnie If you're suggesting football teams don't need good defensive backs then I don't agree with you. It's an 11 person game :thumbup:

Waxhead- for many years now statisticians will delight in showing you that 60-70% of play takes place in the middle of the field of play. This being the case it is almost essential that the midfield of any team is peopled by players who have been gifted with more than normal fitness, and attitude, to enable, not only in creating good football, but in winning and getting control of the ball in the first place so that such endeavour can begin. In Carpenter and Raso the Matildas appear to have 2 ready made candidates to work in midfield but it would appear they are needed elsewhere. cheers jb.

Brainstrust - You hit on more than a few problems for the Aussie squad in this offering. You start by denigrating the defensive attitude apparently taken by the American coach when in fact his doctrine regarding getting players behind the ball when ball possession is lost has been around since Herrera perfected it back in 1960, at Inter Milan, yes, 60 years ago, Don't worry, it is a malaise often witnessed when watching the Socceroos trying to break down an organised defence. You then hint at the introduction of Wheeler into the fray, as adding mobility and ball winning to the Aussie effort when in fact probably a more detailed view would have been the lack of drive out of midfield before Wheeler's intro that being a much more worrisome problem for the coaching staff. You could also have added the difference when an experienced centre-back with good organising skills came into the equation. All in all there was more to be learned from the first hour of this game. cheers jb

Yes Matildas were lucky to grab a draw but they'll never be a real force in world football until they find 5-6 good reliable defenders. They haven't had any for 3 yrs now and again looked very unstable for the whole game of this draw with US. Matildas have some good mid fielders and forwards but defence remains their achilles heel. The back line again looked very poor and slow last night imo

Sometimes you can have too much of a good thing, this US coach is obsessed with players tracking back , while its good to have eight, nine or ten players in the area , a lot of the time it was on few players, they expended enormous energy without a threat there . So that had two effects, they didnt rush the numbers foward that they had on the first goal to make it easy and take full advantage of Australias inability to get their midfielders back in the area, and their players showed signs of tiredness in their finishing. So Australia keeping the scoreline at 1-0 when Australia finally got a useful sub on the field Wheeler who had some energy and win the ball, great play by Sam Kerr to set the shot up, the US had two players glued to her , others rushing back into the area where the were no other players. You always run the risk of deflection if you hang back instead of closing a player down, so it wasn't that lucky it deflected into the goal. If you could guarantee this coach was going to get sacked with a heavy loss that would have been preferrable.

I enjoyed the match.... defense is an issue hopefully that young centre back pairing can get enough game time in before the world cup to improve and get used to each other... As an aside its hard to find fault with 10's coverage....