With my coaching hat on, and my teaching hat as well, as I've thought about this area of the game, goal scoring is far more than striking the ball, as it is defined in the NC.

Scoring goals  needs an entire rewrite in the NC. It isn't just shooting with both feet and heading as defined in the NC in the 4 technique criteria  section.  

Scoring goals  involves checking; delaying runs, timing late runs into the pen box, angling runs; shaking markers; competing in 1v1 in physical duels against markers with an onus on getting a shot away; 1v1 dribbling; playing 1-2s on the edge of the box in central areas to break lines;  shooting from square balls, through balls, angled balls, bouncing  balls, volleys, at best with  one touch for all opportunities. It also involves shooting with the foot closest to the direction of the squarish cross.

It also involves one active keeper and a number of active defenders as opposition to  out play as well. 

In 2008 I watched the Socceroos, minus Kewell and Dukes, practice shooting  in a training session in a home game just before we played Qatar at Etihad. There was a keeper, Schwarzer, and Valeri as the active defender providing opposition. The cream of the Socceroos, including Cahill, Kennedy, McDonald, Emo, Bresc, couldn't hit the side of a barn in practice!

ATM if Youlley continues on his current trajectory from what I've seen with the national u23s and u20s,  he will be one of our greatest ever. He needs to learn to tackle with his left foot though, not just his preferred right foot.

The big problem with very good younger players many don't ever reach their potential, peak early, suffer injury or inexplicably fade out. Think Kaz Patafta, Josh McDonald, Danial Da Silva, Stu Musalik.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2025_AFC_U-20_Asian_Cup_qualification

Results against last place group teams don't count for 2nd place table. Interestingly some groups still have clashes that could see the last placed team change and therefore potentially changing how many points can be considered for 2nd placed rankings.

Australia currently in the last 2nd placed spot that qualifies but a lot to change in a day. 

18th place for seniors at the asian cup converting touches in pen area to goals. In otherwords how effective we are at converting dangerous situations. We are comparable to the powerhouses in asia for getting into dangerous situations and of course our defense is good

18th best in u20s or overall? No wonder we struggle with that placing! 

Our defensive minded players have had better success than our offensive ones. We are just as good as the top sides in asia at getting into dangerous areas but poor when we arrive! 18th best in asia at converting penalty area entries to goals! 

Im curious about the stat u asked for - game time in the a league by position. This could be a big factor if foreigners are disproportinately taking up attacking positions

It’s clear we consistently struggle to score goals at international level, it’s something that needs to be fixed into the future. 

There's no way this team is beating saudi. Hopefully the best 2nd place finish will be enough 

Some interesting stats about our all age teams in asian cups

U17 points per game: 1.8
U20 points per game: 1.7
U23 points per game: 1.4
socceroos points per game: 1.9


u17 goals per game: 2.1
u20 goals per game: 1.7
u23 goals per game: 0.8
senior goals per game: 1.9

A couple of thoughts
1) there is clear decline in relative quality until our players trodge off to europe and close the gap. In the last window there were a lot of u23 players unavailable due to clubs not releasing them. I don't remember this being much of a problem for underage teams in the last 10 years now
2) at 0.8 goals per game for the olyroos it isn't that much of an outlier to go goalless in a tournament
3) extrapolating back to u15s (an admittedly dodgy assumption since there are only 3 data points I'm using to form a trend!) our u15s would be as good as japan and perhaps the best in asia

Looking at the 2nd place table we have to beat saudi just to qualify for the asian cup! Crazy! 

On the plus side makes for an exciting match

Forgot about musa!

Irankunda younis okon toure bennie and hall i think are the missing crew

Daniel Bennie and Musa Toure surely

Who's playing in Europe that would've been included, apart from Nestory?

The #YoungSocceroos came from behind against Palestine to make it three consecutive #AFCU20 qualifying wins and set up a huge match with Saudi Arabia for top spot in Group D.

⚽ Rhys Youlley 45+1'
⚽ Alex Badolato 75'

Yull was great for Adelaide last season, even though he had to play all across the midfield. Hope he can kick on 

Yeah surprised by di pizio

Hopefully players dont drop in confidence going back to their clubs. Ccm have so many games this year he should be good. Worried waddingham might start the season slow if his confidence has taken a knock

Youlley is a class above. Surely he starts making the bench for Westerloo's top team. Yull has been very good over the 3 games & I like Deli. I was expecting Di Pizio to be one of our stand outs, but he hasn't really done much

looking forward to the game v saudi, much more fun to watch us against teams we aren't expecting to dominate

yull and youlley probably our best at 1v1 which is weird, lack of 1v1. Quintal ok but inconsistent

jovanovic looks really tricky as second striker. It's old school but I did like waddingham and jovanovic together, was a shame about the finishing though

of course this squad  is missing euroroos

luca jovanovic for a nice assist for the 2nd goal which was scored by bodalato. Youlley with the first from a set piece

Youlley looks the best player though its hard to judge the back 5 since we aren't defending much. There was a nice sliding tackle from our left back

palestine to their credit did slightly less gamesmanship than our other opponents, so that meant less time wasting and they tired. We played some pretty amazing attacking interplay in the 2nd half, but still shooting was poor. 

Waddingham missed an empty net at point blank and got subbed immediately after. Hope the man management is good because confidence is important at this age

well that was frustrating

Palestine is organized and quite technical! They played well and see no different to an oman, bahrain sort of team

We are quite good at getting into good areas but just panic and can't hit the side of a barn. At least finishing can improve with age more than other aspects of technique

waddingham and jovanovic look like players that if the a league season was a proper length could really develop into players that could go places. Still could. Really good at finding space in tight areas. Big season coming up. Think caputo is even better. But they need to improve their finishing

youlley bodalato di pizio jovanovic and waddingham all starting along with brace scorer kikianis

going for all out attack here

They made their own curriculum but their 100 year plan was to have 100 pro clubs, they have expanded like crazy so the law of large numbers works in their favour
not sure if there is a short cut I suppose

For a long time and a long time ago the Japanese national team had this problem. Skill in most other areas but just couldn't score reliably. It would be interesting to see what changed in their coaching system. Maybe nothing, maybe it was just natural evolution along with the development of the J League and huge growth in popularity of and participation in football. But now Samurai Blue are rabid scorers.

might do some stats. Wonder if there is anywhere I can get team sheets from several seasons ago. Transfermarkt might have it

Aleague level 

At aleague level or abroad?

I’m curious if there is a stat on how many match minutes Australian attackers get on average compared to other outfield players plus the GK get.

That would be interesting to see if that theory had any evidence. 

That would make sense, in the end it’s only just a base for the clubs to follow and go from there.