the three stoogesArnold, Harper and Slater are all close mates.
the three stoogesArnold, Harper and Slater are all close mates.
That's a fair point, and may well be true re: a future in the PL (or elsewhere for that matter), but my personal feeling is, that in order for that move to happen, it would need to be one of the big clubs as Ange has already stated that the lure of European football was a part of why he came to Parkhead. He is very ambitious, as we know, and I believe he will be at for Celtic 2-3 years. He also wants to leave his mark at Celtic, as also previously stated, and what better way than to take a former giant of European football back to some level of Champions League success. And BTW, I am not ruling him out of achieving that.
this is the waySlater led the pro-Sydney cabal with Harper as his court jester. Fos is just very emotionally attached to the National Squad so he'll exaggerate the ups and downs.
Socceroos play Japan tonight and can help book auto-qualification for Japan if we lose. Amazing when you think how poorly Japan started this set of games and how we gave up a point when we played them last and we were flying at that point. How the wheels have fallen of our campaign and how our preparations for a must win game has been an absolute joke.
I will watch but have no expectations on a win or even a draw tonight - how far Australian soccer has fallen in less than 12 months is astounding.
There's some talk that FFA should take a risk. Be bold (rather than bland) and enquire with Marcelo Bielsa as to whether he would be interested in coaching the Australian national team. Rumour has it that before he signed to coach Leeds 3-4 years ago, there was a faction within FFA who were keen to approach him.
In some ways it would be good to miss this year, it's Qatar, we ain't getting out of the group even if we make it, and it might put a rocket under the FFA.
Hoping we miss too. A *smile* place to play a world cup. More corrupt than anything FIFA has run before - and that's a pretty big task. And as you gents suggest, really don't deserve a place in the cup. We'll embarrass ourselves.Seriously, I'm starting to hope we don't qualify which might trigger a clean out of the Arnold loving Sydney FFA cancer that's sending us backwards at a rate of knots. For *smile* sake, we're debuting 34yo striker in Bruno Fornaroli?!?!?! What *smile* madness is that. Gets me so *smile* angry to see how far we've dropped over recent times. If the FFA has a tiger skin somewhere in their offices it's time to burn the *smile*.
There's some talk that FFA should take a risk. Be bold (rather than bland) and enquire with Marcelo Bielsa as to whether he would be interested in coaching the Australian national team. Rumour has it that before he signed to coach Leeds 3-4 years ago, there was a faction within FFA who were keen to approach him.
In some ways it would be good to miss this year, it's Qatar, we ain't getting out of the group even if we make it, and it might put a rocket under the FFA.
I doubt we'll get past the 3rd placed nation in the other Asian group, let alone trouble a South American opponent to follow. Sadly, we don't deserve a place in the Qatar WC.
Regarding your comment about the venue Ian. Did you notice the standard of the playing surface? Non league English sides, like Kidderminster Harriers and Boreham Wood are playing on better surfaces at their home grounds, in the depths of an English winter (as we saw during their FA Cup runs). It looked like a surface we might have seen international football played on, in the African nations cup in the 1970s.where do i start? i have heaps to say...
Arnold has to go and has to go now. He is destroying this team.
Firstly he has his favourites he always selects (Duke, King, Grant, Redmayne, Wilkinson, Ryan, etc). It made Mitch Langerak retire (while Ryan was our best player last night, Langerak should be played ahead of him on form and playing minutes at club level). He failed to cap Cristian Volpato, who has now chosen Italy over Australia.
Secondly, I just don’t think he knows what he is doing. McLaren should have started. Stensness, Metcalfe and Hrustic are promising players and are part of our future but should not have been our starting midfield for such an important game. Fornaroli should have came on at half time knowing we had to score goals. Tilio on earlier as well.
Our system is useless. It’s a mish-mash of nothing. We struggled with their pressing. We couldn’t create in transition. Backwards passing when you need to go forward. There was no width. The wingers and fullbacks were not in the game at all. we left gaping holes in the midfield for Minamino to exploit (on another day he would have scored a hattrick). And the one real chance we had was fluffed by Mitch Duke (when McLaren or Fornaroli would have buried it). 2-0 flattered us. it should have been 5-1.
Away from the A-League, Arnold’s record is appalling. He only got the gig because his mates in the Sydney media hounded out Ange. If the guy had any integrity, he would walk away and let someone else take charge for the playoffs.
it all comes down to money. and Football Australia doesn't have any.
yet they still play last night’s game in a half full stadium no one likes going to. All of our home qualifiers were played in Sydney with the exception Vietnam at AAMI Park which sold out in 10 days. I was originally gonna head up for this game but decided not to out of principle (plus I knew we’d lose).
I am starting to believe James Johnson is as useless as his predecessors.
I have argued against the “missing the world cup will give us the kick up the bum we deserve” narrative. Partly because the qualifying money comes in handy, and partly because the game is struggling in Australia and we need our 2 weeks in the limelight.
But I think I am now starting to come around to it. Football Australia really needs rocket up them to ensure youth development gets the priority it deserves. Andy Harper had a massive crack after the game on CH10 and I agreed with every word of it.
Our opponent will be either UAE or Iraq. The game will be played in Qatar, so it’s virtually an away game for us. Its also a good time to remind people that UAE knocked us out of the last Asian Cup in 2019 (they were the host nation).
To Finish off, if he is consistent, we should be expecting Robbie Slater to call for his best mate’s head
View attachment 14850
where do i start? i have heaps to say...
Arnold has to go and has to go now. He is destroying this team.
Firstly he has his favourites he always selects (Duke, King, Grant, Redmayne, Wilkinson, Ryan, etc). It made Mitch Langerak retire (while Ryan was our best player last night, Langerak should be played ahead of him on form and playing minutes at club level). He failed to cap Cristian Volpato, who has now chosen Italy over Australia.
Secondly, I just don’t think he knows what he is doing. McLaren should have started. Stensness, Metcalfe and Hrustic are promising players and are part of our future but should not have been our starting midfield for such an important game. Fornaroli should have came on at half time knowing we had to score goals. Tilio on earlier as well.
Our system is useless. It’s a mish-mash of nothing. We struggled with their pressing. We couldn’t create in transition. Backwards passing when you need to go forward. There was no width. The wingers and fullbacks were not in the game at all. we left gaping holes in the midfield for Minamino to exploit (on another day he would have scored a hattrick). And the one real chance we had was fluffed by Mitch Duke (when McLaren or Fornaroli would have buried it). 2-0 flattered us. it should have been 5-1.
Away from the A-League, Arnold’s record is appalling. He only got the gig because his mates in the Sydney media hounded out Ange. If the guy had any integrity, he would walk away and let someone else take charge for the playoffs.
it all comes down to money. and Football Australia doesn't have any.
yet they still play last night’s game in a half full stadium no one likes going to. All of our home qualifiers were played in Sydney with the exception Vietnam at AAMI Park which sold out in 10 days. I was originally gonna head up for this game but decided not to out of principle (plus I knew we’d lose).
I am starting to believe James Johnson is as useless as his predecessors.
I have argued against the “missing the world cup will give us the kick up the bum we deserve” narrative. Partly because the qualifying money comes in handy, and partly because the game is struggling in Australia and we need our 2 weeks in the limelight.
But I think I am now starting to come around to it. Football Australia really needs rocket up them to ensure youth development gets the priority it deserves. Andy Harper had a massive crack after the game on CH10 and I agreed with every word of it.
Our opponent will be either UAE or Iraq. The game will be played in Qatar, so it’s virtually an away game for us. Its also a good time to remind people that UAE knocked us out of the last Asian Cup in 2019 (they were the host nation).
To Finish off, if he is consistent, we should be expecting Robbie Slater to call for his best mate’s head
View attachment 14850
Italians kicked out by the Makedonskis. Bloody hell.
The eternal problem for Aussie soccer, apart from our small population, is that most of our football talent plays in the AFL. The greatest striker we've never had notched goal 1000 tonight.