Ha ha!

I'm in that age category! I want to see a few different players with a different skill set selected for the Socceroos.

Yengi hasn't scored at a SR of 1 goals every 2 games for  his club has he? This is a good scoring rate for strikers.

Reading an article where Yengi was interviewed, he said he has had a lot of physical battles with CBs in League 1. He claims most of the opponents are much stronger than him. Yet I saw him perform a feat  of immense physical strength in the Asian Cup, where he turned an opposition  big unit, who was sitting tight on him. I think Yengi has more  fast improvement to come, as another poster  posted that he only took up football at age 14. He is a fast learner.

I've also liked  Yengi's dribbling around the pen box. 

Plenty of action across Asia. Pakistan a potential banana peel for Jordan who still haven't won in this stage. Saudi host Tajikistan in this group so you'd expect the big guns to stroll ahead.

Indonesia host Vietnam in a regional clash with Indonesia buoyed on b the Asian up. Iraq lead the group undefeated while The Philippines linger. 

How did we miss how good yengi is? A goal every 90 minutes in all comps so far and lots of strings in his bow

I think leckie took up football at 14 too?

Worst case scenario and best case scenario for xi?

My best case is


---------------ryan----------------
-natty-souttar-rowles-bos-
--------hrustic-irvine----------
----------------nisbet--------
--metcalf----yengi-mcgree---

Some serious fun in that line up and mcgree combines better with bos than an out and out winger

If we can be up by 2 at HT then for the love of god please put some newer players on with 30 to go. It's not like we're going to miss out but with a bit of luck, we win and Bangladesh Palestine draw, we could afford to lose the next 3 games and still qualify. If the calculator is correct, it would seem a 7 point gap would already guarantee a top 2 finish as 3 teams on 2 points playing each other simply can't gain enough for 2 teams to jump Australia. 

Very unlikely but 3 teams including Australia could land on 9 points and it'd come down to GD. Not going to bother.

https://ultra.zone/2026-FIFA-World-Cup-qualification-AFC-Second-Round#group=i

Amazing that Jordan still haven't won in this stage?

Not much experience in this line up, Grazor.

Hrustic also makes too many mistakes and thinks too slowly to play DM or 6. He has struggled playing it previously for Aus. One needs a much quicker thinker in this position.

If Hrustic is selected in the team he needs to play further forwards. Then if he makes mistakes, they aren't in such critical positions on the pitch. He has made some impressive attacking contributions in the past  with his technical quality on the ball.

A goal every 90 mins is impressive.

Horrid squad to choose a best case fantasy from...

                      Ryan
        Deng Soutter Rowles
Atkinson       Irvine.         Bos
      Hrustic. Nisbet  Mcgree
                    Yengi

I am sure it has been answered, but what do we have to do to qualify with this ludicrous amount of teams? thanks in advance 

• Finish in top two of this group, then:
• We are placed in a group of 6 (similar to the old system), where the top 2 directly qualify, and 3rd and 4th reach another stage. However, this time there are 3 groups of 6, rather than 2 groups of 6, so the group difficulty should (theoretically) be easier.
• If we finish in 3rd or 4th in the above group, we will be placed into another group of 3 (With the other 3rd and 4th placed teams) where the winners of each group will qualify for the world cup, and then the runners up will have a home/away playoff to determine the AFC's entrant in the new FIFA playoff tournament (which will also feature 10th placed Africa, 4th and 5th CONCACAF, 7th placed South America, and runner up in Oceania), which will see two nations qualify.
• Format for that is that they will use the FIFA rankings to seed the draw, and give the highest ranked countries a bye through the first round of that playoff tournament (1 v [4v5] and 2 v [3v6])

Ok sweet. Ta. 

turn it up BT :)
You talking to me haha ?!
Don't pigeon hole all us babys from boomers - I'm in a very good space balanced between the old and new, got a 18yrs daughter and 2 older sons that my habits are nothing like from my parents gen otherwise they would have had me reported and locked up lol......
Arnie though is typical conservative of old that has merit and his coaching decisions is for all to see - especially at SFC before, he gets results more than not despite us being frustrated by his starting line ups.
I'm no huge fan but best we got with what we got.
I'll be shouting from the stands to make changes by the 60min mark - especially throwing on some of the young and newbies.
Below is just 6hrs ago and typical Arnie as I mentioned :
"The most important thing is pretty much to stick to what we've done. We've got one training session tonight to remind them of the tactical side of things. The worst thing I believe I can do is change too much and confuse, and when you confuse you get frustration. So it's about keeping things very, very simple."
https://www.socceroos.com.au/match/australia-v-lebanon-afc-asian-qualifiers-2026-wc-22-03-2024/22278569#!/match-preview

Looking forward being there in about 6hrs - perfect football climate around 16c by 8pm.

Sorry LFC! Lame attempt by myself to understand Arnold ‘logic’ of not starting an in-form/better Yengi instead of Duke 🤷‍♂️

he piss's me off alot as well believe me.
I think he's one piece of the puzzle I dropped watching AL during his SFC tenure.
Same situation, he'd leave good young promising prospects on the bench till the 85min or more but threw on earlier bloody Matt wrecking ball Simon.
And thats what he wanted, Simon piss off the defenders for as we know he lacked skill for all to see but aggro.
It worked but this drove away alot of promising SFC academy players, they left to BR or wherever.
Funnily see the connect he using Duke instead of Yengi.

apology accepted.

Right then vs Lebanon tonight we should win what are the kpis?

I say 3-0 it will be good to see some new players given a go tonight 

https://www.socceroos.com.au/match/australia-v-lebanon-afc-asian-qualifiers-2026-wc-22-03-2024/22278569#!/live-match
Check out the form MCG.....
Head to head 2 previous encounters both our way.

Seriously for me, playing at home, 4 at least thats what I expect !
Will be interesting how big lebanese support will be for we have a shedload of them here.
Hope our support gets noisy and spurs our Roos on.

Will be interesting to be honest. Last time we played was in November 2018, with 33,268 in attendance at Accor Stadium. Although, this doubled as Tim Cahill's retirement match.

The only confusion in changing the lineup would be Arnie's not being able to remember the newbie's name. I don't think Yengi would have any trouble knowing what to do!

Spot on. Yengi had no trouble in the one game he got at ACup - attacking flair around/in box got Roos a penalty 

https://www.youtube.com/live/mPrSaPsrdfY?si=euYFqU39QJaC9Oez

Football Australia have the game up. Where the stream works remains to be seen. Czech and Thai vpn normally works. 

442 diamond formation it seems

---natty---burgess---souttar---rowles-
---------------------baccus---------------------
--metcalf-----------------------irvine---------
-------------------mcgree----------------------
----------taggart---yengi-----------------

Team in 

                          Ryan 
Atkinson Souttar Burgess Rowles
                  Baccus Irvine 
             Metcalfe    McGree
                  Yengi Taggart

Expect Metcalfe more right after employing it well for St Pauli. Good to forgo a 10 as it allows Metcalfe and McGree more freedom to come central. Two up top. Nice! Hope it works. 
         

 Lineup released

1. Ryan
2. Atkinson
3. Souttar
4. Burgess
5. Rowles
6. Baccus
7. Irvine
8. McGree
9. Metcalfe
10. Taggart
11. Yengi

Feel like Bos would've been perfect in this lineup, have to assume it's because he was the last arrival to the camp from Europe and it taking it easy?

If it's narrow OK then you'd expect McGree to drift out left. Can't expect Rowles too high. Stupid late game prevent Bos being so fresh as this would allow him to fly up the wing. 

Just happy for a more club based form team. 

Hrustic is playing a mooy like deep lying play maker for his club but arnie might not trust his decision making playing out the back despite his brilliance

Bos's defence must not be trusted to play left back yet, so he keeps playing him at wing or not at all

I can understand that when playing away from home, but at home we should be more aggressive

Later arrival yes. I like this idea though of Irvine hugging the inside meaning if Bos were playing he'd be up and down the wing. 

I can't remember the last time we play a great game from start til finish. Even the 4-0 beating Indonesia was still a pretty bad game. 

Is it nearly a full house at CommBank stadium?