As far as the tournament goes, I think we hosted it very well. Nothing seemed to be over promoted to the hilt. It was well thought out. Brisbane pitch was the only real let down as far as tournament quality pitches go, the early heat was a bit of a let down as well. Probably unavoidable in any country in AFC.

Best thing non tournament organisation wise... Was we finally got the win we've been chasing since 2006 in Germany and the credibility we deserve to go forward with now. We've been missing this for so long now its not even funny.

The final piece of the puzzle to really solidify the belief in the players minds, the belief that they are not just underdogs anymore, the belief that if they work hard enough they can become quality World class players.

Lack of public hype meant that I was the only one in my circle to enjoy this great event. I find it sad that a large part of Australia is still ignorant to what they've missed out on.

Lack of public hype meant that I was the only one in my circle to enjoy this great event. I find it sad that a large part of Australia is still ignorant to what they've missed out on.

These few weeks have been some of the best in my entire footballing life. I've absolutely loved every minute of it.

Which surprises me, as being fully honest I wasn't overly excited when it was announced we would host it, I left getting my tickets seemingly late, and I didn't really board the hype train fully until I was sitting at Hunter Stadium and watched the Japan/Palestine game. From then on, I've been fully hooked on it.

I don't truly believe that we were the best option for the 2022 World Cup, but man oh man I would have been one of the happiest guys in the world if we were to host that.

I don't really have any negatives for the Cup that I can think of tbh. Free train travel was one of the best things they could have done, I got to see Japan and Australia play at Hunter Stadium, the guys at Across the Tasman have been seeding the games ( :lol: ), SantoSam+Ed have had Asian Cup Fever, and I've just loved it all. Maybe if Brisbane's pitch was a little better I would have said it was completely perfect. Also maybe I'll say that throwing a few HAL games in on the weekend was a bit odd.

So I'll give the Cup 9/10.

The Cup itself is pretty garbage imo.

What ever happened to sleek slim trophies.

-PB

A tournament victory is a tournament victory.
If we win im waiting to see how some people will play it down, saying eg what you said (jap etc) .
This is BS.
I see where you are coming from. I just hope we win.

Some people would complain that "yeah we won the world cup, but we didn't play Germany in the final so its not really as good"

The icing on the cake will have to be if and when Australia wins this Asian Cup. It's not a certainty. It'll be a real downer if we loose.

The tournament would have been ideal, as I see it, if the top teams made it to the semi finals. I'd have liked to see Iran, Japan, Australia and Korea all in the semis. To me, the semis were a bit of a let down because of the two weaker teams there, i.e. Iraq and UAE. Not taking away any of those two teams' efforts at overcoming favourites in Iran and Japan.

9/10, when you've got mates who hate the sport telling you how awesome the Iran/Iraq game was you know the tournament has done great

Edited by The Maco: 29/1/2015 12:03:11 PM