oh amazing! Curious to see more of pim's era considering how I remember it

now have everything from our wcq against argentina till today except for Pim's qualification games (which would be interesting to rewatch) and our confederation cup run

This is looking like the greatest thread ever 

I have been looking for that colombian game for years, I remember watching that on a tiny tv 

Is the NZ WC warm up game there? One where i think holman scored 

Cant find it but would love to add it!

Funny thing is Kewell was offside for our goal too wasn't he?
Just an insane game all round

Would have made better drama if that goal was disallowed and the second wasnt allowing us to go through with the final kick of the game

Hiddink was playing for extra time banking on Italy getting tired after the red card.
It was a gamble that cost us in the end. I truly think if we had pushed in the last 20 things may have been different.

Such a shame our two best chances (from memory) fell to chippers as well.

Losing kewell and emerton was massive and such a massive shame (emerton was an idiot for the handball) but the red card was a big chunk of luck given Materazzi tackled his own player aha

Italy were the most dangerous even in 10 men and they rode the momentum of this crazy game to the final.

aha yeah not sure my heart would have survived

Never forgive Hiddink for only making one sub in that Italy game. Idiotic. All the subs were match fit. What was he worried about? Them gassing out in the 30 minutes of extra time he thought we were going to get?

You right? Doing you a bunch of favours here and you're dragging up ancient history?

Nice.

Wrong colombia game I was thinking of the one in colombia in about 2002...colosimo was playing from memory.

But watching that old  one - how is the state of Markovski upfront lol - the good old days hey

Not sure what you mean? Certainty greatful for the uploads i probably said something wrong without meaning it

by melbourne soccer i meant a youtube account

or was the offending comment the nickname manrubz? I thought that was your nickname but if its an offensive shorthand ill drop jt

I wonder if the Japs still cry about this like people do Grosso

Red and clearest pen you can get

It's stuff like this that makes you realise that it's no use crying about the Italy penalty at all really.

Sure it may have been a tad harsh, but it was still a reckless challenge by Neill. We have also had our fair share of calls going our way. 

End of the day, we were up by a man for over 40 minutes, and we could not make use of that. Italy deserved to go through. 

Plus Hiddink fucked up by saving our substitutes for extra time instead of going for it in the 90 minutes.

Yeah it was bad luck to be fair. If the pen happens ten minutes earlier he can adjust. Or if oz hold on for one more minute we have a big advantage having 2 free subs and a one man advantage



penalties in football are as random as forward pass rule in nrl. No point complaining at the inconsistency just hope you are lucky on the day

Just watched the highlights of the Denmark game.

Biggest clown moment has to go to Juric. 88th minute, beautiful cross goes into the box. Slightly behind Leckie but still a very good chance. Juric comes SPRINTING in with absolute tunnel vision. He only sees the ball going into the box and runs to try and get to it. Somehow not seeing that Leckie is already set and in position to receive it.

Fucking barrels right into Leckie who scuffs the shot due to Juric taking out his leg as he goes to strike it.

Simulation. Watch it live and slow. The Japanese player kicks the ball away and then lifts his right leg to fall forward over Cahill and I don't even think there is contact preceding his going to ground. No Japanese player claimed anything and both officials didn't even budge. Cahill's foot goes between the legs.

We made our mistakes but the penalty decision was a disgrace. Absolute flop. Neill basically lies down and Grosso just walks over him and trails a leg and falls. I'll admit I was surprised about Italy's red.

This is an awesome thread, please keep this at all costs! 

I wonder if someone could do this for old a-league games as well? 

@johnszasz

I disagree on both :) 

but that’s football and us fans :) 

Thanks for not abusing me like some on here do. 

I have to laugh when the world cup 06 controversy list has things from all 4 of our games. We've never had a game without something controversial. 

fucking classic
I loved Markovski

yeah same 

no worrries bud 


yeah indeed it follows us

Absolutely awesome thread, HUGE THANKS to all who contribute with links ... This is going to be attacked with gusto on the off season , plenty of matches to re-watch before the WC starts :)

Hahahahahahahah Gold Jerry, gold....... 

Good thread, someone should sticky it...

That miss by kennedy and mistake by schwarz against serbia…3-0 would have been enough to go through

wasnt to be. With two reds it was a rotten world cup but we still nearly went through

True.

I thought a critical game for us was playing a 0-0 draw with China away under Pim.

Our embryonic football media, not used to WCQing campaigns, responded negatively.

However, many Socceroos who have presented at Football Australia National Coaching Conferences, were desperate for Aus to be able to play programatic  football away from home. Often a draw was simply needed in the overall context of  a successful WCQ campaign. In the past the Socceroos had been on the receiving end too often in key WCQs, playing away from home. They felt like they nearly always lost the key moments of big games.

Alistair Edwards, Tony Franken and Ante Jukic would have been pleased with that Chinese pragmatic, hard-nosed performance in a WCQ campaign. The Socceroos had finally learnt how to play football with a low probability of losing.