Cool story.

They also just got annihilated at home. He's not playing for Bayern Munich, he's playing for a side that got into the back door of the CL and whom are very likely going to finish bottom of the group.

The Danish league is no better than the Championship in reality, I'd argue it's probably weaker on average across the board.

The fact that Midtylland's owner is also the owner of Brentford (his main project) and prioritises the London side over the Danish side is also pretty telling.

As for Souttar - as I said, he's more than doing well, he's the third highest ranked player in the entire division by more than 1 website.

Here's some central defenders whom have recently competed in the Championship:

Ben White (23 - Leeds) - Brighton knocked back a £30m offer from Leeds after his season on loan in the championship last year. The year prior he spent at L1 Peterborough and L2 Newport (Sound familiar?)

Joe Rodon (23 - Swansea) - Moved to Tottenham for £12m after his 2019 seasons in the championship for Swansea

Ben Godfrey (22 - Norwich) - Moved to Everton for £25m after yoyo-ing from the Championship to PL with Norwich

White is the only one of those 3 that had this sort of form for a sustained period in the championship. The last CB to average what Souttar is currently across a full season in the championship is current Brighton captain and English international Lewis Dunk.

You are underestimating this sort of form and how competitive this league is.

 Aaron Mooy as an example  was ranked inside the top 80 in Huddersfields 16/17 campaign and there were dozens of people on here waxing lyrical about him. Luongo, Irvine and Wright have never been higher than the top 200. Mooy was probably Australia's star player, even at Huddersfield in 16/17'. All three of them are Socceroo regulars.

Birmingham fans are already ripping into McGree…. it's not an easy league.


I couldn't care less where he was born, we have lost plenty of Australian players over the years to other countries for that to be thrown out the window.


Trust me, as a Leeds fan, I've watched the Championship week in week out for a few years now. If you are considered anywhere close to a top 10 player in the league, you are a legitimate PL quality player, or a top 5 European league caliber player. We don't exactly have them fall out of trees at the moment and despite all the whining by some on here regarding how hard done by the likes of Milligan and Sainsbury were, both of them shot blanks in Europe for the most part.

The test will be for Souttar to replicate it the form across a whole season.

The fact that fans are celebrating a player that isn’t born here shows where we really are in our development as a football nation right now.

We are acting like a small nation act when they get a naturalised player to play for their country, once a upon a time ago Australia used to develop players at top 5 leagues at a impressive rate produced from our own backyard and now we are celebrating players achievements like Souttar and Boyle who are not from here, how much we have fallen since 2006...

The other 210 members of FIFA are all playing by the same nationality rules as us.

We never needed to take advantage of it then, so why now? I think people know the answer why.

We never needed to take advantage of it then, so why now? I think people know the answer why.

We never needed to take advantage of it then, so why now? I think people know the answer why.

Are Birmingham fans really ripping into McGree, on the basis of one substitute appearance? ‘Ripping in’? Really? 

Are Birmingham fans really ripping into McGree, on the basis of one substitute appearance? ‘Ripping in’? Really? 

I think they got their noses out of joint when McGree said in his first interview that Birmingham was a "stepping stone" move for him. So he got them offside from day one.

In fairness, in the past which footballers raised abroad (but with Aussie passports) put up their hands to represent Australia?

There may be some. But no examples leap to mind (for me, at any rate)

In fairness, in the past which footballers raised abroad (but with Aussie passports) put up their hands to represent Australia?

There may be some. But no examples leap to mind (for me, at any rate)

It's also less than encouraging if Australia's best footballers in the NT grow up entirely in other countries.

Exactly right. Somewhat silly but his head was certainly in Carolina. I bet the coach or trainer said something like 'a good stepping stone before you venture off to America.'

No malice or disrespect was meant there. His pathway is set so he'll end up saying something along those lines. 

Okay but how many of them weren't raised in Australia altogether.

Heaps. I'm not going to spend my limited free time going through it one by one for you though unfortunately, but feel free to read through yourself, wiki is pretty good for Australian football history.

Far, far bigger football countries than us have been capping players that have been born and grown up overseas for many years now. Hargraves for England, Kevin Kuranyi for Germany, Diego Costa for Spain, Deco for Portugal, Eduardo for Croatia, just going off the top of my head as I type. Very many more examples.

I wasn't suggesting that you go through them individually :) I'm also not too keen on sifting through all the names there to find out who didn't grow up in Australia at all.

Most of the names from recent years are blokes who came to Australia when they were very small (or at most, in their teens):
Jimmy Jeggo, Milos Degenek, Apostolos Giannou, Ange (bit further back), Connor Pain, Daniel Arzani, Thomas Deng, Awer Mabil, Archie Thompson, Nikita Rukyavytsya, Bruce Djite, Eli Babalj, Dario Vidosic.

Their situations are poles apart from Souttar and Boyle. If the wikipedia page were altered to "List of Australia international soccer players who didn't grow up in Australia", they, at least, wouldn't be in the page.

As regards, those for other countries... I grant you Deco and Owen Hargreaves. Kevin Kuranyi and Eduardo were in their mid teens when they moved to Europe. Diego Costa, yep, but I reckon he comes across as a it of a mercenary ). I guess, aside from Hargreaves, most of those guys at least lived in the country which they representing. They became naturalised. They at least had lived in the country that they played for.

Martin Boyle hadn't actually set foot in Australia before he was named in a squad, iirc. And Souttar has never actually lived in Australia, AFAIK. Although, imo, if you are naturalised as an adult (and if you still have the opportunity to represent the country you grew up in), oughtn't to be playing for Australia, I reckon. Other countries may do it. And it is unlawful to discriminate in the workplace. But this whole situation (across the world) doesn't make me any happier. That Australia is starting to copy other countries makes it worse.

On this debate. I would love it more if we won over players who had never lived here and got them to move to Australia after their careers are done. I want their sons and daughters to grow up here and play for the national teams as well. Feed them a few Tim Tams, play them some Aussie rock anthems and get them to stab the country of their birth and bearing in the back!

That’s the thing with these names like Deco, Diego Costa, Eduardo etc is that they have played in those countries some from their teens if I’m not correct, a lot different when you haven’t been in the country before let alone have lived there and all of a sudden you are representing that country on the spin in a World Cup qualifier. 

Does Boyle and Souttar have Oz citizenships? 

Even those names on wiki a lot of them played in the old NSL era before playing for the Socceroos, and I can take that as they at least get the mentality of the country and the players. 

Yeah it would be good if Australia got a football culture as a results of successful footballers from abroad having their kids grow up here. Iirc there’s a former A-Leaguer from Brazil whose son has grown up in Aus and is eligible to represent Aus. The lad is playing pro football in Brazil now. Hopefully he opts to play for us (and hopefully he’s a gun)

That’s the thing with these names like Deco, Diego Costa, Eduardo etc is that they have played in those countries some from their teens if I’m not correct, a lot different when you haven’t been in the country before let alone have lived there and all of a sudden you are representing that country on the spin in a World Cup qualifier. 

Does Boyle and Souttar have Oz citizenships? 

Even those names on wiki a lot of them played in the old NSL era before playing for the Socceroos, and I can take that as they at least get the mentality of the country and the players.