He is too deep in our NT, not advanced enough like he usually is.

Ok that's not what I see

He has a lot of defensive duties in his position in the NT, and needs to do the tough work a bit more which draws him back. At Celtic they have essentially 1 player holding and another more attacking minded midfielder beside him, but they both have big defensive roles in covering the defence. However Rogic in that system essentially plays off the striker, he is very advanced and constantly interchanges.

Out of possession he forms a triangle with the other midfielders however as he is so advanced isn't required to cover the defence when they are out of position, so when they win the ball back he is far up the pitch and in position to create with the front 4 and be fluid. In the NT he is too hamstrung by certain duties, it effects his freedom and it leaves our striker so incredibly isolated.

Sounds like a perfect description of his tasks in bp and bpo for the socceroos to me, who do you think plays the more attacking role in midfield then?

Rogic would, but he doesn't have the freedom he does at Celtic which is the difference and has more defensive duties too. 

I would say this is because when he plays for Celtic in the spl they are technically and physically superior to their opponents to a very large degree, when he plays for the Socceroos the differential is much less and quite often we are at a technical disadvantage. The result of this is more time spent in bpo,  more transitions to bpo  and more work for everyone including Rogic.

I think you've put this very well, Clive.

I think DeVere may have more speed over the turf.

I have not really scrutinised his possession game closely in the HAL, but his match stats, including  passing accuracy, and general performance were good against Germany, after one horrific early mistake.

It means more area to over for the other two midfielders.

It could   work  if he was at the apex of  a 4-4-2  midfield diamond, or a 3-4-3 midfield  diamond.

Given the lack of Aussie strikers currently playing regular football, I think it could be an option to play Rogic as a central striker.  Also, there is a lot of depth in central midfield for the Socceroos.

Rogic has scored 10 goals out of 25 starts for Celtic.

I think it'd be best to play our best player in there best position, square pegs in round holes and all that.

I agree it definitely could work - we know Rogic is a lethal finisher, and he might last 90 minutes a bit more often if he was playing up front. As a deep lying striker, so he can still hold the ball up and create.

As a false 9 would be better.

March is a long way off, but players should be playing regular football for the next WCQ. Also, there are issues with non-scoring forwards with very low returns from a lot of Socceroo games.

I seem to remember Gol Gol as a winger, but at jest he scoring goals.

If MacLaren plays as a central striker, he is mobile enough to  rotate with the  two wingers to confuse the defence. Rotation is effective.

From watching the HAL some players have improved their chances and others have exposed weaknesses.



*Weaknesses exposed

Brattan and Kilkenny are not good enough at breaking up attacks for  Socceroo selection. These guys are so far behind Milligan and Jedinak. Both are very good on the ball and Brattan is creative, but in sustained BPO he struggles.

MacLaren is abou the  same height as Fornaroli. Given Fornaroli can use his body, shield and hold the ball up, I'm wondering if MacLaren can add this to his game too?

Rhys Williams is showing that he is way behind the mark as  CB and DM. He also struggled in his old role of RB for the Socceroos.

By his own admission Geria has had a bad start.

Bozanic is nowhere near  Socceroo level.

Cahill is simply a goal sneak , not even good enough for a starting position in a strong HAL team.




*HAL players with a good Socceroo case.

Zullo, Wilko and Grant continue to perform consistently for SFC.

Brosque is playing well, but his composure around goal is inconsistent.

Franjic has the skill set, but needs more games.

DeVere has been excellent!

Maclaren is still doing well and improving .

Troisi has been excellent for MV and has helped ignite the team.

Kamau has been good in patches.

Nichols has been good for WSW.

Risdon has been good, but lacks extreme pace.



*Overseas

Rogic is on fire for Celtic.

Gol Gol is scoring regular goals in some eastern European league.

Time for Leckie to play RB. He has 8% conversion rate for the Socceroos from over 40 caps. Ditto Kruse.



I don't read Aussie Abroad enough to appraise other players.



Thoughts?

When I raise issues wit Kilkenny and brat tan's off the ball work, McKay, Brillante, Rostyn Griffiths and O'Neill have all been very good in BPO in the HAL. Valeri has not been too bad either.


Kilkenny often makes challenges after reading the play effectively, but loses too many of those challenges. On the other hand Milligan not only reads where potential tackles are, but if he gets there he wins most of them.

We definitely need a shake up personnel wise and i feel we need a change in formation to help accommodate some players. We all know the fullback situation, we may aswell give Leckie a shot at RB as at least he could go forward. The midfield for me is unbalanced, going by the midfield in the last game we had Jedinak, Mooy and Rogic, two of whom not in the regular positions and i'd say all have a role they aren't comfortable with. Jedinak can break up plays but his distribution isn't up to scratch, Rogic has too many defensive duties and Mooy is lost not being the playmaker. This is where i feel a move to a 4-2-3-1 is beneficial, it'll help Jedinak out and allow Mooy to create from deep for us while giving Rogic freedom at the 10.

But then we move to our front 3, there are no goals from any of them but what is worse is absolutely no effort pressing either. Just look at Maclaren's heat map vs Thailand, he legitimately didn't even turn up on the map that's how little he moved. If we are going to play this formation we need the front 3 and most defnitely the striker to be able to run and press all game and create space for others. I don't know who could do that job for us, i'll definitely be giving Gol Gol a chance too, he has a knack for goals at the moment and we need that.

but we got 3-4 players who best position is no 10. I'm more worried about scoring goals, we need someone who can shoot, that only person is Rogic unfortunately, until Ange pulls his finger out and looks at our actual striker issue.

Something like this with Rogic in an advanced role.

----------------Irvine-----------------

Mooy-----------------------Luongo------

Kruse------Rogic-----------Leckie---------

Kruse and Leckie are not scoring goals, time to try GolGol and Goodwin. This campaign could fail with no goalscoring. No-one has a mortgage on a spot in the team. No-one is a great, the exception is Cahill.

This is my two cents......
Hopefully Juric will be healthy soon and playing, Behich needs another chance at RB as he is doing well in a good league, Goodwin should get a shot as he is scoring and getting assists atm, this also shows his adaptability to conditions and maybe Gol Gol deserves a shot but I don't know if he is playing striker or winger or how his team plays?
Both Sains and Spira are a bit slow, we need someone who is a bit pacey in CD, how fast are Devere and Wilko? If they are quicker, I would be selecting one of them. From what I remember I think Devere is quite quick, maybe a bit more limited, but his speed would be important for us.
Jedi is still an important player still, an old head who asserts his will, a real leader. But luongo and Irvine should replace him as the starter at some point, I lean more to luongo, with Irvine pushing his way into the team.
If Maty get's a loan somewhere he should start, otherwise I would be giving Jones a go, he seems to be doing great atm.
RB an RW are the biggest problems, a fit Franjic should start at RB, but I liked Tongyik's debut, seems to have a good head on his shoulders as well, he is one to watch. I still think Burns is our best option as the advanced RW, he's a proven goal scorer and can dribble.
Mooy hasn't played well recently for the NT and I think adjusting to conditions and more games took their toll, but when he is on his game he is brilliant, but if he is not Luongo or even Milligan would be a better option.

I honestly think a 4-4-1-1 would suit us.

Maty
Franjic - Devere - Sains - Behich
Leckie - Luongo - Mooy - Goodwin
Rogic
Juric

If we go the usual formation I would go with:

Maty
Franjic - Devere - Sains - Behich
Jedi - Mooy
Burns - Rogic - Goodwin
Juric

Agree time to take the pressure off the team by having Kruse and Leckie given the flick.

8%   goal conversion rate from each player, both having played  over 40  games is atrocious.


My new line up:

................................Langerak

Grant..............Sains..........Spira...........Zullo

..............................Milligan
..................Mooy...................Troisi

Burns...................Rogic................Goodwin



This is based on all players playing regularly.

Burns needs to lift his game time to be selected. Otherwise Gol Gol may be worth a look at. 

If Leckie starts playing RB in club football, Smith starts getting regular game time preferably on the continent, as well as Ryan moving to another La Liga club, they can all play.


Troisi provides the speed and athleticism needed in midfield.

Subs for my line up:

DeVere
MacLaren
Kruse
Leckie
Ryan
Luongo
Irvine
Gol Gol
Kamau
Jedinak
Gersbach
Cahill

Unfortunately, I've seen little of Degenek and McGowan play as CBs.

My line up also assumes Juric is still injured.

Solved.


.................................Milligan

.................Mooy...................Troisi



Rogic plays central striker.

I just watched the match against Thailand and they played out of their skin, but we played horrible. On second glance Mooy was not as bad as I thought, he made passes where players didn't expect, he was probably our top player, I reckon Jedi was our second best,
It was a right weird game, if King Bhumibol Adulyadej didn't sleep the long slumber, we would have won. But I think for some unfathomable reason our team just wasn't in it, Leckie had a horrible game, Spira turned into a nut job. Rogic was never near his game and same for Smith, Kruse was out of form (I so wish he got game time, he is so potent when in form).
Our fb are terrible

In these two stages of  the campaign, I'm trying to think of some good away performances against decent opponents.

Tajkistan and Banga  were okay games, but the opponents were modest.

That we nicked the points against the UAE must be the best result of the whole qualifiers. They've shown themselves to be serious challengers for the WC spots and the away win gave our campaign some legs.

so more or less revert to a 4-4-2 with one striker sitting deep?

Nah I don't like it. I actually like our 4-3-3 formation.

So next year we have:

Iraq away somewhere probably iran?
UAE at home
Saudi Arabia at home
Japan away 
Thailand at home

I think in retrospect myself and others were too hard on the performances against the Saudis and Thailand. 

Looking back the last 10 years we have always found it almost impossible to win in the middle east and have lost to teams far far worse than the Saudis. A draw there sucks because its only a point but its a really hard earned point. And against the Thai's we will see. We don't know how hard that fixture really is. Only Japan has played there (and it's a lot closer to japan). Maybe the thai's will beat all the arabs at home and we can look back and see that a point wasn't so bad. 



Personally I think the Saudis will get blown out next year and it will be a race between the japs, united arabs and us. The saudis have Australia, UAE and Thailand away and japan at home...they may well lose all 4 and pick up a win vs iraq to finish on 13 points.  

These days its hard to play with any less than 3 in the middle. Getting constantly dominated in the middle won't allow us to play in our way. 

I like our system generally. 433 and 442 diamond depending on the game. The thing that hasn't been working is the selections of out of form players,