year-old Socceroo believes his form merits brighter praise this season.

"It's funny how the media, people and critics, analyse things. They watch the games but they might not watch them too well," he said.

"You can have a great game but if you lose, you're playing s**t. That's the view in this league.

"I believe I've had a good season doing very similar things to last season ... I'm still creating goals and chances.

"Whether it's scored or not, offside or not, at the end of the day I'm doing my job by putting the ball there.

"But people don't see that. They just see the scores and results."

http://www.theherald.com.au/story/5251246/troisi-fires-up-over-a-league-form/?cs=2439

Just putting it here for reference. Saudi with a friendly against Moldova today. Winning 1:0. Their calendar and player location seems to allow more camps and games. 

Meet the quiet Socceroos bolter making huge noises in Korea

Connor Chapman’s rise from an emerging A-League prospect to one of the top defenders in the K-League has put the former Newcastle and Melbourne City man right in the heart of calculations for Russia.

https://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/article/2018/02/27/meet-quiet-socceroos-bolter-making-huge-noises-korea

I get sick of reading players talk about how much harder their overseas teams train than their A-league teams.

What if it is true?

I've heard this repeatedly about South K and Japan.

If its true its remarkable

intensity of training should be the easiest area to catch up to europe with!

still only 22!
Thought he was a bit older than that!

To be 22 and have played as much football as that means he could still have a bright future

Pretty sure he is currently injured. I've always been a massive fan of his and thought he deserved his place in the national team. Unfortunately his career choices have been quite poor, injuries too regular and i cant help but feel he has left his run too late

Connor Chapman has always been a great young talent, captain of both the u17s and u20s at the world cup and a decent ball playing defender too boot.

I wonder if hes 2v1 defending has improved, that was probably the main weakness in his game when i saw him at Melbourne City. 

Anyway he might be another to watch out for in the future.

To be fair to Chapman he is doing pretty much everything that could be asked of him at the moment. He is playing basically week in week out and by all reports playing quite well in a league i think the majority would rate above the A league. 

Perhaps his next step is a move to Europe and push on from there

Decentric - absolutely not doubting it, just sick of hearing it. Why don’t they train that hard locally?

I felt during the time where he and Curtis Good were as centre backs that they were the next and best generation defenders especially after the young socceroos world cup, i felt from there that hes next move was in Europe.

Hes in Korea so im not sure if can noticed from european clubs from there, but hes 23 so time is on his time side if he can make it as a socceroo. 

Perhaps its the mentality here, no intensity and no competition for places mean complacency creeps in from the players to the coaches.

Its no wonder the players feel comfortable here and look at times out of place overseas depending on the league of course. 

I have heard A-league teams train 4 days a week for a couple of hours and are lazy bastards for the rest of the week. I could be wrong but thats what I heard. Sounds pathetic I know. 

No reserve grade is A MASSIVE ISSUE at NPL level. So I would think it'd be even worse in the a-league. No reserve grade and just having youth teams is so f--king retarded it blows my mind. 

Possibly the influence of Raymond Verheijen. He contends that once a player trains more than a certain amount of time, injuries occur much more frequently.

I've read players who've played in South Korea state they pay no attention to training loads.

Then ironically our players seem more prone to getting injured once they step outside of our restricted training environment here

Unless all of our players are training in birdsville... heat hasnt hurt brazil or mexico or costa rica and the humidity in japan and asia is just as bad or worse than here as well

I actually think it has to do with lack of competition for places etc but there's no way heat doesn't play a factor in game intensity so it's pretty fair to think it would affect training too (even if they change training times).

just seven A-League starts but Melbourne City teenager Daniel Arzani says he's as ready as he'll ever be for a Socceroos call-up.
Source: AAP

https://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/article/2018/02/28/im-ready-socceroos-call-says-arzani

The more I think about it the more it occurs to me that, despite our lacklustre goal-scoring, with the right combination of the attacking ingredients available, our NT should be plenty capable of scoring in the latter two matches (while having a solid enough defence behind them to prevent conceding too many goals). I'd go with 4-2-3-1 (flat-ish back four). But the key is the combination of our front four attacking footballers:


------------------------------------Juric-------------------------------------


Arzani---------------------------Mooy-----------------------------Leckie

None of them are prolific scorers, but all of them can score. And, crucially, they all offer something different. Mooy can pull the strings, Leckie is great on the counter-attack, Arzani can cut through more congested defences by combining his speed and close control and Juric holds up the ball well. It will make them really strong on the counter-attack and Arzani's presence gives them some ability when they're attacking a set defence.

Plus, in terms of defensive ability, Leckie is excellent, Juric is useful and Mooy is a defensive asset when he's playing so high up. We then have a bit of depth and variety, too, with Kruse, Rogic and Cahill off the bench.

I reckon that has the potential to be strongest (and most balanced) attack that Australia has had in AGES!

Remember games arent won on paper. Consideration needs to be given to each of the direct opponents and what is going to be effective against them. Obviously leckie is going to be good against an aging fullback or a fullback who is intent on attacking as it will open space behind however you get a genuine fullback in the maldini mold and leckie is all but useless as he doesnt have the space to attack into. All of a sudden Kruse is a better option.

On the other side of the ledger you have azani who for all his good work going forward is a defensive liability if you come up against a really attacking fullback who is going to continue to go past him

Sound logic, mate. I agree with you unreservedly on that. I'm talking generically, but I suppose it's rather tricky to talk generically about three matches against specific opponents.

To a point, I took Arzani's defensive weaknesses into account by not suggesting that he should play against the French. But I do think Arzani is critical to us being more likely to break down defences and to score. And, let's face it, we'll need to score goals against Denmark and Peru. In those two matches, I think that BVM will have to compromise on our defensive ability in the front to some extent. Maybe the question is left side or right side for Arzani?

Anyway, let's look at Denmark. I think we can use their matches against Ireland as a kind of blueprint for how they'll set up defensively against us. That's 4-2-3-1, with Andreas Christensen at right-back and with Jens Larsen at left-back. I don't know much about Larsen's style. But Christensen seems to be very sound in attack and defence. He'll go forward. So maybe it would be better if Leckie is matched up with him. As you say, that'll give Leckie space into which he can attack. And also Leckie will be able to defend better than Arzani. So maybe Leckie on the left-wing against the Danes?

Here's a compilation of Christensen against Ireland

More bolts from Lewis

Fresh start for reluctant bolter Yeboah

With a new bolter seemingly pinpointed with each passing week during the countdown to this month’s friendlies against Norway and Colombia and the FIFA World Cup, Yeboah, 23, is more concerned with helping the German 3.Liga promotion chasers seal a return to the second tier.

https://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/article/2018/03/01/fresh-start-reluctant-bolter-yeboah

What is funny is he does the pinpointing

Borello, Nabbout, and  Arzani are playing too well not to be picked. Kruse needs the shock of not being picked to motivate him to return. He's been quite complacent. Maclaren at this rate has barely any compared to those three.  

Can all 3 of them be picked in the same squad though??

If we were to take 4 wingers would you be happy with Leckie, Borello, Nabbout, Arzani

Well this starts the arguement of just how good Kruse is after his injury.

Good enough I think, but I think Nabbout should be aiming a bit higher than the J-League (farrrk), he will not develop in some shit league.

Borello is ok right where he is but I'm hoping he will be consistent first before a call up.

Agree and I would also like to see Petratos get a go. Troisi has played himself out of the squad and I think sadly, Timmy is in real trouble. 

Need to see them in friendlies I think. Nabbout should get a start, its just a friendly ffs. See if he can impact the game , use as much of his Newcastle form as possible, take it up a notch. Give it shit. This would help us gauge the standard of the A-League better.