Any national youth teams in action any time soon, m or f (that may be training camps)? seems as though the Technical set up at FA has moved solely toward the Socceroos and Matildas and left the youth teams for another time.. I may be wrong due to Covid rules changing every other day, although only two states are in lockdown surely the other states can get together for national team training camps or id camps to keep some type of momentum going? 

Also has FA announced an under 23 mens head coach having advertised for it? 

The U23s (1999 born and later) should be playing the AFC U23 Championships Qualifiers next month. 

Will be held just a few weeks before A league season starts and not during an international window. With 2 weeks quarantine coming back I'd assume not many A League players would be going but what if the euro based players cant be released or wont want to go? Could really be a problem.

Honestly can’t see us going to this.

I actually think it’ll be fine for A-League players to participate for two reasons:

1. There’s a full 3 weeks in between the end of the AFC qualifying tournament in October and the A-League season starting in late November.

2. The international break / FIFA window actually begins after this qualifying tournament has fully completed, so clubs will have their own senior international players unavailable at a far more inconvenient time in early November. By the time of this November FIFA window beginning, the Olyroos would already be back in Australia and almost finished hotel quarantine.

The other question for me is will we select a squad of 1999 or 2001 born players?

The obvious reason being the 2024 Olympics age limit is 2001 born.

I believe Japan regularly implements this strategy and sends younger players to the AFC U23 competitions to give them the advantage of an extra 2 years of preparation for the Olympics.

And hypothetically if we decide to go with the 2001 strategy, how many 2001-born players are actually starting players for their A-League clubs? Maybe a handful?

So if the FA only calls up these 2001-born players, clubs are unlikely to kick up much of a fuss anyway as they’ll probably see it as great exposure for their player who was unlikely to receive game time as a starter anyway.

We don't have that luxury, we've just got to qualify & worry about everything after that

A-league Players who could be selected
Adelaide: Delaniov, Gauci, M. Toure, A. Toure, Cavallo
Brisbane: Trewin, Powell, Akbari, Ivanovic, Parsons
Central Coast: Hatch, Miller, Nisbet (age?), Balard, Tsekenis
Macarthur: Suman, Hollman, Martis?, Najjar, Ruhs
Melbourne City: Metcalfe, Tilio, Sutton, Taleb, Stokes, Mills, , Gomulka, Lesiotis 
Melbourne Victory: Kirdar, Anderson, Lauton, Bello, Barnett, Brooks, Iannucci, Lawrie-Lattanzio
Newcastle: Thurgate, Silvera, Goodwin, Yengi, James, R. Warland, A.-Taay, Archibald, Armson, Grozos, Mauragis, 
Perth: Ostler, Walsh, Rawlins, Burke-Gilroy, Bodnar, Timmins  Bramwell, Bafford
Sydney: Pavlesic, King, Van der Saag, Wood
Wanderers: Natta, Mourdoukoutas, Wilmering,  Russell (age?) , Aquilina, Carluccio, Najjarine, Auglah

Would also been unfair on the 2000/2001 players too. Most of the Olympic squad would’ve been 1997-99 born so most these guys would miss out in both cycles.

Yeah I agree it’s harsh on the individuals but definitely would be for the greater good of the next generation to have that additional two year advantage IF we had enough quality to use the younger talent pool like Japan does.

Personally I would be for sure taking the strongest-possible squad, but the above scenario is interesting to consider if it becomes sort of forced by the A-League clubs refusing to release their older, more established players. 

So out of all the young players playing for a reserve team now, who do we think has the best chance to be a key player for the socceroos?

Kuol, Volpato, Circati and Jing Reec

This would be a potential squad: 
GK: Bilokapic, Pavlesic, James
DF: Aquilina, Trewin, Natta, Courtney-Perkins, Mauragis, Grdic
MF: Watts, Nieuwenhof, Teague, D'Arrigo, Robertson, 
FW: Kuol, Hammond, Tilio, M. Touré, Brook, Hollman, Reec, Bayew

Is Nieuwenhof still injured? Apparently he's had a bad long term injury.

Not 100% sure, although he's supposed to be fit for the start of the season. 

Ok because he's probably someone you could bank being the next batch of u23 midfielders if he's fully fit and playing for Sydney FC.

Wait and see how Noah Botic goes at Western United & don't forget Cam Peupion 

Yeah definitely, those are two players I'd just exclude from this squad

Bump to clear some of the Inside sport spam

All the national team focus is rightly on the socceroos and matildas upcoming games but I was wondering about the upcoming u/23 asian cup qualifiers later this month

According to wikipedia, there have been some changes.
1. Brunei has withdrawn from our group meaning only 2 games against china and indo
2. The games have been moved from indonesia to Tajikistan. Assuming due to covid but thats a big change. 
3. Dates pushed back a bit. Olyroos play indo 27th Oct then play China on 2 Nov.

So the final game will be held 17 days before the first A league game in Melbourne.

How do these changes affect the squad that will be picked?
A lot further for A-league players to travel compared to going to indo but not easy for Euro based players either.
Assuming by then that A-league players will only have to do 1 week home quarantine instead of 2 weeks hotel quarantine but this cant be guaranteed.

A lot of other asian teams already announced their squads and I'd assume we would have to name our squad this week as its just 17 days to first match and you'd assume we would need a few days in camp to acclimatise etc.
Plus, do we even have an u/23 manager anymore? - Arnie pulled the pin after the olympics. And final game is too close to socceroos game on 11th november for Arnie to go (and Genreau and Arzani if they are to be picked for socceroos games)

China's under 23 and under 20 teams dont look that great on paper but we must beat them to ensure we can get through to the under 23 asian cup which are the qualifiers for the olympics. I'm sure our B or even C squad could do the job but its all about squad availability. Any other time this would be relatively straightforward but covid really complicates things

Wonder if Ch 10 will show the games? - would be on at 11pm AEST

Also just saw that Tajikistan is also hosting their group at the same stadium starting the 25th October.  Means that our 1st game against indo will be the 3rd game played on that pitch and our game against china will be the 9th game played on that pitch within 9 days.  I dont think the Tajik's are famous for their good playing surfaces let alone ground maintenance. This might affect likely tactics and hence squad selection.

9 games in 9 days on one pitch?? That is actually nuts.

According to another Wikipedia update today, China has also withdrawn and it’s now just the one game:

Olyroos vs Indonesia on 27 October in Tajikistan.

Surely that can’t be right?? How can you have a “group” with only two teams?

Fingers crossed FA have an update on Youth National sides in the near future following any clarifications on Covid Protocol. 

May be negligent to use youth teams as the "guinea pigs" for overseas sport travel and quarantine issues, hopefully following the Matildas home games and Socceroos possibly getting a home game the protocols might be made clearer. 

It would be quite proactive for Head coaches/managers to be announced or any confirmation on how the future of youth national teams are going to be run. May be a quick in house hire once COVID protocols are determined (Arnold looks to develop this group of incoming 23's, Morgan 17's and ?? 20's once interstate travel is up and running once again). 

trevor morgan rumoured to be taking 23s

Who is the technical director and who is making these football decisions? 

Oh, that is understandable Under 17 coach, Under 23's coach acting Assistant to the senior squad and acting Technical director. Good way to keep continuity. 

Seems to be confirmed, according to this article yesterday. http://www.china.org.cn/sports/2021-10/12/content_77802609.htm

So weird, it surely cant go ahead now as you cant have a group with just 2 teams. If it does go ahead, we can send our D team to beat indo.

China has only ever made 1 Olympics for football, but qualified for all previous u/23 AFC Cup. For such a big country investing so much into youth development, this isreally surprising. And with the economic influence they have, you'd think that they could have persuaded the AFC to delay the games or something.  I guess thats how hardcore the Chinese are with their covid restricitons.

Seriously?