We could offer trillions of dollars in bribes that an enquiry on gamesmanship take place and nothing would ever change with these ME teams. It's an utter disgrace. The Uzbek refs generally stamp it out. I'd love to see refs from other confederations come in one day. Scottish refs are good and would just laugh.

we usually start youth tournaments slowly. Lack of camps and friendlies perhaps

it is a shame we faced Saudi first game. They are usually in the top 5 in asia at senior level

a scottish reffing a middle eastern team would be fun to watch!

Even a german ref is usually happy to hand out yellows for diving

They had chances but they didnt take them, I knew this would happen though we usually start quite slow in tournaments due to limited preparation and lack of games as a team but once Saudi Arabia scored they lost their confidence.

At least they got another game on Monday which they need to win you would think.

However I did like the look of Quintal, another technical wizard in the attacking third who looked our best player especially in the first half where the best chances came from.

I did recall Brad Maloney saying how these teams Australia up against train, eat and play together which makes an big difference at this level so something for Football Australia to ponder with a AIS style centre of excellence for future tournaments if a-league academies aren't enough.

The referee wasnt good I agree, too much stop start and nothing favoured for Australia.

yeah qualifying is so crucial. games against the top 4-5 teams are probably a league level. World cup games maybe slightly higher. Play a few games like that a year and it kick starts our career.

I'd love us to spend money having a friendly tournament against some npl all stars teams or something. We always look much better after 3 games together

I'm still fairly happy with the technical ability of a lot of the players at this age. Decent awareness of space and movement and not afraid to try the good ball.

China will be tricky and Tajikistan typically have good youth teams. 

We dominated play up to the goal, which was just a massive fuck up. The better team definitely lost. We just needed to take our chances early in the game. Some really good players in the squad, but is the entire squad picked from the a league? Do we not have any quality os based players, that could've been selected?

https://youtu.be/ZklQkpW7N-c

Highlights

The best eligible OS player is Noa Skoko, who wants to play for Croatia. Calder from Luzern didn't really impress in the games in Uzbekistan. Smith from Crewe did ok when he played, but the left backs selected are probably better. Treffiletti from Monza did really well, but he's 2008 born, so maybe he was deemed a little too young for this group. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WLbFrlXXHo4

South Korea excellent. Qatar shit.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pIXTN3BJOI8

Japan Uzbekistan good at this level.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVAdrZMNUQI

China-Tajikistan in our group ended 1:1

anyone got a link to the olyroos v france live stream?

https://www.facebook.com/100092176674089/videos/814037053414090/

Half time 
Australia 2-0 France

The point is that  at this level level  results don't  count for much compared to long term development for senior football. Players only have a short time in underage levels. Many peak early, and never develop as seniors. Even in Aus, Kaz Patafta, was one of the best in the world at age 16, and never became a full time pro for a  sustained period at senior level.

The main objective at underage level  is to provide a steady stream of players to kick on at senior level.

What age?

This is amazing! 

France have usually one of the best production lines for producing great quantity of quality senior international footballers. The three best in the world ATM are Arg, France and Brazil.

WE just blew France off the park and only lost the semi due  to goal keeper errors...

I must be dreaming...

the french team was an under 18 side whereas we were under 23 so don't get to excited

It was the U23's. France were playing a younger team comparative to us but it was still an impressive performance.

It was an interesting, frustrating and exciting tournament. We rotated our squad heavily and didn't really play our best team (so did France against us). There were some inexcusable defensive errors which resulted in losses to Qatar and Panama. But we also largely controlled the games we played and looked the better team.  

Ta.

Controlling games is important.

Lol, if Australia never made massive fuckups in defence we'd be undefeated world champions!

The issue is we repeatedly produce very poor defenders, who buckle under pressure and have huge mental lapses very regularly. U18s crap defence, u23s crap defence...The future is not looking bright at this stage. 

https://twitter.com/FootballAUS?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor

Goals here. It's not even half time and we're up 4:1 vs China. 

Irankunda on fire and also had a penalty saved early on. 

We just had a second penalty saved! 

Can someone please link the game. I can't see the bastard thing on 10play even though they say it's there. 

4-2 flattering for China, but we're wasting chances.

https://10play.com.au/live/10sport

https://10play.com.au/live/   should give you the entire channel overview. 

We won't win this now.

Pretty good first half. Irankunda and Bennie excellent. Midfield ok with di pizio and Antoniou been good too.
defense needs work, Lebib good in the air but slow footed, barrie technically good but lacks effort, oneill pretty mediocre. Pavlesic with a few errors also.

Found it. FFS. They don't make it easy.