Some Thoughts on the Reaction to Socceroos vs Egypt
I think a lot of people on social media were overreacting, as is to be expected in the immediate aftermath of a gut-wrenching defeat. I think the Socceroos played reasonably well, while I was naturally nervous watching the match I thought they controlled the ball well and nullified any threat Egypt showed with the ball for much of the game so there was a level of control for most of it. A few gambles regarding the penalty shootout didn't pay off and now many are saying this is a failure of a campaign, but I think it's been pretty solid. International football's always a bit of a crapshoot and the match against Egypt was always going to be a coin toss. Our FIFA rankings are similar, the bookies had us at similar odds, the underlying stats were even and the scoreline after 120 minutes was even.
Ultimately, it is still the closest the Socceroos have come to winning a knockout match in the World Cup. Some people are also being obtuse in my opinion by saying that exiting in the Round of 32 is the equivalent of exiting in the group stage of the 32-team World Cups in the past, since making the last 32 is much harder when you have to play teams outside the AFC. In my view, the Socceroos' group at this World Cup was honestly more difficult in terms of the average quality of each team than their group in 2022, yet the Socceroos still managed to finish second over Paraguay and Turkey which is no mean feat. Paraguay and Turkey, the two teams against which we got points at this World Cup, seemed far more impressive to me than Denmark and Tunisia from 2022, who were both very lacklustre then and now.
I also understand that people don't want the Socceroos to be seen as gallant underdogs anymore, but there is a reason that Popovic played such a defensive shape during this tournament, As I mentioned previously, international football unfortunately can only ever be a crapshoot because the tournaments are only a handful of games, and mostly knockouts if you make it far. In such a format, one moment can end your campaign, so all the incentive is to play in a manner that enables you to win in the short-term. While the Socceroos' didn't score many, we also conceded only one goal from open play in 4 games, which was the foundation that enabled us to finish second in a difficult group and nearly make it to the Round of 16. I certainly don't regard the approach highly for club football, but that just demonstrates why club football is far superior to international football, since it actually rewards teams for playing positively. Whereas in international tournaments you can have fairly limited teams such as Croatia at World Cups 2018 and 2022 and Portugal at Euro 2016 who forced their way via extra time and penalties to be finalists and champions.
In short, the style of play often sucks because the dynamic of international football often sucks.
I actually think this would be a good angle to promote the A-League. One of the things I realised watching this tournament after watching most Perth Glory games this season is that it's actually somewhat annoying how every game at the World Cup is do or die. While obviously that's where the tension and drama comes from, it doesn't have that nice ebb and flow between games of lesser and greater significance that a full club season does. Furthermore, you actually get your season's worth of fun regardless of how good your team is, as opposed to the frustrating feeling we're all feeling now where we would have loved the Socceroos to just have one more game at least at this tournament, but instead there's this emptiness.
So the Roos in a utopia could adopt the Japanese model of developing players to attack and play with the ball, and Australia as a country could fund and promote the game accordingly, but that itself is no guarantor of success at these tournaments. There are basically no guarantors of success at World Cups because of how fluky knockout football is, apart from maybe just having lots of obscenely good players like France has, although that is extremely rare. Japan played much more beautiful football in this tournament, they scored more goals, but ultimately they fell short in the knockouts again because they lacked that defensive grit and stubbornness, and also the fortune required to make it through, As long as those sorts of games such as Brazil vs Japan keep happening, I understand why Australian coaches will continue to ensure that teams prioritise defence, even if that is 'negative' or unpleasant to watch.
Onto the Asian Cup and Women's World Cup 💛💚