Not when 15 of those goals came against an absolute abortion of a team. Taking that one game out of the equation, how is his strike rate now?

I cant ever remember McDonald playing poorly for australia, can you?

Archibald does get into some very good positions and he does tend to be on the end of many chances unfortunately for archibald he scores about 1 in ten of those chances. He would be absolutely deadly if he had a slightly better finishing touch and understood the offside rule :lol:

FFS read my other posts where i agree that archibald has more to his game than scoring ](*,)

Edited by stfa_striker: 8/11/2012 03:05:21 PM

=d> =d> =d> =d> =d>

Does anyone remember his partnership with allsop against the brilliance of indonesia

He'll be 35 in Brazil.

That's if we qualify, is Archie justifying himself to be on the field in these World Cup qualifiers? Or no he isn't because of his age?

The original question is, what would it take for you for Archie's selection in the national team (albit as a sub) to be justified?

Imo since he came back to the Socceroos against Saudi Arabia, he has been a game changer and has swung the attacking momentum in our favour every time, if he's not scoring he's creating chances for our team by moving the ball forward towards goal at full pace meanwhile some of the other players are walking around scratching their butts.

To some extent i agree with what you're saying the only problem with it is that the other players arent getting their chance to displace him as holger constantly uses the tried and tested in games where we should be providing the opportunites to younger players to earn their place.

Holger knows what the likes of neill, swarz, jedinak, valeri, wilkshire, bresc, cahill, thompson etc are capable of. WHat does he gain from playing them in meaningless friendlies?

Seems to do well for the Roos in that aspect :lol:


True, it is disappointing that in some friendlies Holger hasn't experimented.

And, when younger guys that could displace Archie have a chance, like Ruka and Troisi...they don't perform. There is a little bit of the guys not grabbing their chance and Archie working his way in with this one.

Of course, it is disappointing that Holger doesn't persist in throwing chances to some other guys along the way. Would be nice to see how Leckie goes against SK, am hoping he at least gets a run on Wednesday. Am hoping that he performs well, if given a run.

Leckie would be a good one and could play a similar role to Archie. Younger, faster, but I do question his finishing...perfect replacement :D

With the EACQ's coming up, Holger will be forced to use some different players. Best shot for some of the younger guys to grab a spot for themselves. Archie will certainly be there, so I expect to hear more complaints when that tournament comes around :lol:

But, as we come closer to the EACQs, I'm wondering what other striking options we will have for it. Maybe Kennedy, barring injury (missed Nagoya's last match).

Edited by Ali07: 8/11/2012 03:30:46 PM

For me it is all about the number of times he misses a sitter in front ..... or is offside.

If he was a good striker he would have doubled his tally twice over.

He gets tired and he gets sloopy with his timing ............... he does well against tired legs ..... obviously he is a super sub.

I like him as an option off the bench in the last ten minutes. I don't like the fact that he is taking up a younger persons spot who might be a world beater in waiting ???????

If we had one of those, their club form alone would be making the push. Can't think of an upcoming Aussie striker that seems like a world beater.

I can't think of an upcoming Aussie striker that seems like an Archie beater. Apparently neither can Holger. Therein lies the difficulty.

All we have is potential, hopefully some of them realise their potential (Leckie, Babalj, Bulut).

We've got some older players in the likes of Kennedy and Macca (don't know if we will see him again), but I doubt if one of those two come in...it'd knock Archie out of the squad all together.

More appropriately I can't think of one not selected in this squad or playing at the AFC U19s already.

Not at all. In terms of natural strikers It's really only Babalj at the moment who seems to have the potential to become good enough to nail down the spot.
Maybe Gameiro or Tombides are on their way too.

True, might see Gameiro make seem leaps. And I would love to see Tombides get back on the track he was seemingly heading down.

This.

for all those advocating the removal of Archie, and I can see your point, imagine where The Socceroos would be without his three goals....

Can anyone explain to me how after getting dumped by Pim, he got back into the team?

-- Club form wasn't that great.
-- He'd barely scored a goal for the national team since we moved into Asia.
-- His other "famed" skills have never come out at international level i.e. he can't dribble past anyone.

-- He was on fire all season, if not scoring he was constantly getting assists, he was also selected to play because we were missing half of our 1st team and the dead rubber was in Melbourne
--He has barely played for the national team since we moved into Asia
--I've seen his famed skills performing at international level, he could do everything except score it seems (missing sitters), he got dropped after getting a long term injury against China at altitude.

-- 7 goals and 7 assists for MV is hardly on fire. Mitch Nichols had 10 goals and 5 assists. Mitch Ncchols has better stats. Mitch Nichols.
-- He's played 24 games for the national team. That's not "barely" considering how useless he really is.
-- Those skills were on show when Pim called him hopeless.

I can see him being taken over to brazil, purely because from what I understand he makes training for the roos enjoyable. he's the good vibe in the camp.

morale does play it, but surely at that level....

Under Holger Archie has 8 games and scored 3 goals. This is quite a good return and if he can continue scoring I see no reason not to have him in the squad all the way to and including the 2014 WC.
One other player has also played 8 games for Australia under Holger, he has 8 goals and 3 assists. It would be really good to see a fit Joshua Kennedy playing for Australia again.
Another player has played 8 games for Australia under Holger and has managed no goals. I do not know why McDonald has not scored for Australia, he is a good enough player but I guess opportunities will be limited now.

Information taken from http://www.transfermarkt.co.uk/en/holger-osieck/spieler/trainer_181_3433_2010-08-11_2014-06-30.html

Edited by reds are best: 9/11/2012 12:00:05 AM

I see whats going on here.

Another Roaroo, I won't be complaining. :cool:

So, who deserves a shot ahead of him right now? Love it that you bring up the past, which I admit wasn't good for Archie, and seem blind to what he is doing now for the Roos.

As someone pointed out, he has played 8 games under Holger. In four of those games, he turned the momentum of a match, gave us a sniff with a goal, scored another in a friendly, and won us a WCQ.

Guess we can all focus on the past that is convenient to our stance :lol:

RUKAVYTSYA should be our striker, included in all games. i would work with him till i got the potential i needed out of him and go thim to perform.
he is our best prospect.

So no one can explain how he got recalled?

Those "7 goals and 7 assists" all came in the first half of a season where they only play 27 games. So that's roughly fourteen or so games, which is about three and a half months of form, after which he bombed and helped lead Melbourne to their worst ever finish.

I'm just asking a simple question. I'm not ignoring his current achievements. I agreed if there is no one currently better then we'll go in to the WC with this hack.

You're the one who seems to think it's okay we're gambling on the form of a 34 year old whose career peaked with a training stint at PSV.

No gamble, since his goal scoring form for the national team puts other potential strikers to shame.
And that's not counting his build up play which puts a Cahill or Brosque to shame and is more a game breaker than Holman will ever be.

In the end, a coach is entitled to pick who he feels are the best players a country has. Maybe he just like Archie's style of play, and to Holger's credit, he played Archie as more of an attick midflieder/winger, not as an out and out striker.

To answer the question of the thread if Archie was scoring goals and assisting in the A-League even at 34 i wouldnt mind having him on the bench for the Socceroos.
Having said that we already know what Archie can do so i find it very sill by Holger to select him in the next friendly when we have players like Ruka,Leckie,Babalj miss out because of Archie.
Give all these three players a chance for the national team and see how they go and if they cant do a job then you go with Archie for the qualifiers but its just stupid to ignore them for a player who when first picked to play for the Socceroos was having the worst season in the A-League and it was just a joke that he still got picked when lets face it he was simply shit.As for people saying if Archie wasnt in the team and scored those 3 goals where would we be now in the qualifiers i could easily say would Archie have that record of Oar hadnt done the hard work and sent in a pin point cross for him.
In my opinion Archie is not good enough on current club form to get selected and its club form that counts because you cant compare national team form with young promising players who havnt yet been selected to play for their country.
The thing i dont mind about Archie though is that he is atleast on the bench and used as a impact player unlike Brosque who is a starter and should not be anywhere near the national team not even on the bench.