No problem with that.

Fact is other than Schwarz and Cahill, no other squad player has played consistently at the highest club level over Verbeek's tenure.

Verbeek's a mediocre coach, but not even a great coach can turn a sow's ear into a silk purse.



Edited by stefcep: 8/6/2010 12:50:12 PM

Edited by stefcep: 8/6/2010 12:52:00 PM

We are taking 2 and a half strikers to the world cup. Most teams take approx 5.

2006: Viduka, Aloisi, Kennedy, Thompson, Kewell (4.5 because Kewell was never 100%)

2010: Kennedy, Ruka, Kewell (2.5 same as above)

Does not compare.

When we go down in a game, who do we throw on to add some striking power up front? I guess one of the 6 DMFs we have could be a striker huh?

Hey if we win a game or two, great. But its not going to be pretty. Its going to be Greece ala 2004 style - Cahill scoring off a set piece or corner.

This talk that we dont have the tools to play attacking football is the biggest load i ever heard. We are comparative, if not better in terms of personal then we were four years ago. The only different being now we dont have Viduka, and yes i understand thats a massive loss, but its not the be all and end all of our team. Given that, Time cahill was a bench player at the previous world cup, he is now the most consistent performer we have had at club and nation level for as far as i can remember (perhaps Mark Schwartzer is on par).

The problem is not the players, not by a long shot. Pim is the most successful coach ever, not because of his performance, but because of his conditions. From memory even Graham Arnold qualified us for an Asian Cup. No australian team should ever fail to qualify home and away in Asia. Fair enough, we played some defensive football away from home in conditions that did not suit us. I understand that, but we also played some piss poor football at home aswell against nations that we should dominate.

The problem for mine, over the previous two years, has been Pim's unwillingness to change tactics and explore other formations and tempo. you dont go from playing one style for two years to being able to turn it on at the world cup. I do give credit for pim for introducing Williams into the fold and to a lessor extent vidosic; however we do have a lot of talented young players who could potentially have been tested throughout the last 12 months to see if they were upto it. Burns, Vidosic, Nikita, Lowry et all could have all been given more runs, and potentially we would have had our "wilkshire" of 2006 who stood up to make the team really solid.

My last two points, every time we lose, we say "we still have harry coming". no doubt that guys our x factor, but hes playing in turkey. a guy there, Mile Jedinak has had a fantastic season in turkey by all reports, yet has consistently been left on the bench behind an out of form and constantly injured Vince grella.

And lastly, re "we dont have the personel to play attacking football", Kewell, Kennedy, Cahill, Culina, Emerton, Vidosic, Nick Carle, Chipperfield, Joel Griffiths & Scott Macdonald. Go have a look at the form and clubs of these guys over the past 3 years. Compare them to a country like South Korea who play brilliant attacking football. Its never been the players, its always been the mindset.

I know Pim has done his job. he got the world cup, he won a lot of matches and ticked off the boxes. I will support Australia with my all whoever coaches.My complaints are not even a reflection of the last 3 matches (people with memory will remember our poor performance against a low european team before Germany). I cant believe we have managed to find a guy who plays potentially the most boring football i have seen at this level at a time in our country where we could have built up some real excitement and pushed our code forward. All the best to the socceroos, but i will be very glad once Pim is out of our system.

All our strikers? Are you f*cking daft? (Don't answer that, I know the answer already)

"All our strikers" = Scott McDonald. A scoreless striker, no less.

Lets not over exagerate here.

How many "useless balls were lobbed into the box" against the US?
Practically none.

Your arguements are old and stale (just like most of Pim's detractors) to the point that they no longer make sense.

No matter how well we do in South Africa, no matter how we play, no matter who we beat, no matter how we line up, and no matter how far we progress, people will still bitch and whinge and whine.

These people are c*nts.

Pim is the most successful Australian national coach in the history of the game - having got us to two major tournaments in consecutive years.

The only reason people are dropping the bundle after our loss to the USA - where we outplayed our opponent - is that they're so accustomed to winning.

It seems that people who disagree with Pim's selections are now waiting for the WC results to prove that Pim has done a poor job. Ok, so pick an alternate starting 11, then put it next to that of our WC opponents. Regardless of which players you pick, we will be the outsider in all 3 of our group matches. Based on that I just think it'll be unfair to blame Pim entirely if we are outclassed in SA.

Let's remember, Hiddink's Russia lost both home and away to Germany in qualifying, and he had a much, much stronger list of players to pick from than what Australia has.

Yeah, he's probably saying to himself now "...Yes! Jones out. Pim's obviously gonna use his last spot for Viduka".
Though IMO, Viduka wouldn't be bad in goals. Perhaps because he covers half of them standing in front.

The whole "can only do the work with what tools you have available" is a poor excuse imo. Pim selected those tools and left the likes of Macca, Griffiths, Colosimo at home to name a few. The first 2 are scoring for their clubs (Macca started the season slow for Borough but still..) and Colosimo was by far the best defender in the A-League last season.

Pim's persistence with out of form players will be his (and ours) downfall. Why didn't even try Beauchamp for the last 30 minutes on Saturday to see how he would go against the US attack?

Then he goes to a 4-4-2 when he leaves all our strikers at home :roll:
Personally, I'd rather play a lone Macca upfront than a lone Kennedy. At least with Macca we don't just lob useless hopeful balls into the box. The Ireland game last year saw awesome combinations between Macca and Cahill sitting behind him and Macca had a hand in a couple of the goals.

The next manager has a lot of work ahead of him to scout and fill all the voids this generation of players will leave once half of them will retire after this world cup.

ps play Chippers as the lone striker. He scores for his club team all the time!

Not impressed by the way we play at all, but we still havent lost a game under Pim with our full strength team and points on the line (Progression confirmed before loss to China). I stand to be corrected but lets at least wait until Monday morning before we hang Pim!

with so many player out of form I can see where you are coming from seriously, the worst part is Pim does not have a return flight to Aus so he'll only know our pain if he chooses to read about it.

It is clear the attack is missing that someone special but Moore and Grella are killing us at the back, I've never seen Grella so out of his depth, please Pim bring in Valeri [-o<

In my opinion, if they play 'attacking' football, they'll be thumped like they were against USA. Australia have the weakest squad in their group. In any sport, when you have less skilled players, you usually adopt defensive tactics. If we struggle in South Africa, it'll most likely be because we haven't produced enough good players, not because of Pim.

you can only do as much as your tools allow you... and i dont think we really have the players to play top quality attractive football... i don't think there's much point chucking the shits

I am suprised he hasn't brought up Viduka yet......

Sill holding out hope there our delusional little friend?

What can we say about friendlies so far- we beat and drew with Holland, lost to the US, beat Ireland, lost to Korea and beat Denmark. In competition we won 99 percent of our games in Asia and performed poorly. Maybe we should wait after the World Cup before coming to these conclusions, after all these are 'practice matches'.

They would have beaten us 8 -1 if they were skilful converters

lol.

Not sure if a disgrace is right, twat maybe though.

Your the assclown mate.
Firstly with the current players in our stock how can you play attacking football and win? If we play attacking football ei USA we get raped on the counter.
Secondly Denmark was the defensive test, USA was the offensive test. Yes they didnt want to leak 3 goals but Pim needed to see who could play upfront ie Garcia, chippers etc.

The only reason we are playing defensivly is because there is no other way we can play football and win. If we go all out attack against USA and they should have beaten us 5-1 how badly can Serbia or Germany beat us?

We have to play to our strengths to win and thats very defensive and realying on crosses and set pieces to Cahill and Kennedy.

AND if it wasnt Pim it would probably be ARNOLD...take your pick mate

Edited by Felixx_17: 7/6/2010 08:53:03 PM

So what are you trying to say?

Less than a week to go mate and frankly I'd rather be positive about our chances than not.

I disagree.

His defensive style is killing us. I mentioned before we will be cut to pieces by a half decent side. USA being half decent.

We are unable to conjure up ANY SORT OF PRODUCTIVE FOOTBALL. We rely on set pieces, which we rarely obtain due to the ball being in our half for most of the time.

Pim thinks his defensive style keeps us solid. He is a fucking assclown. We were cut to pieces through midfield and down the flanks by the US.

We are fucked. Fuck you Pim you tosspot. I mentioned many times we should have got rid of the imbecile over a year ago. He has no idea what he is doing.

Edited by seriously: 7/6/2010 08:43:10 PM