Really hoping this isn't a one off. Can just see the prospect of A-League clubs losing their shit if this is permanent and they find out they'll potentially lose players from November to January for this and the Asian Cup in one season.

oh yay, as if the asian cup isn't shitty enough...

Gee it must be hard being a football fan when you hate it and it's fans so much.

people actually WANT to play the Japanese.

Not many want to play Australia. They don't take us seriously.

FFA needs to have the balls to hold the line. HAL clubs should also harden up and learn to use their reserves. We complain about not having enough youth players coming in but this is a legitimate reason for mixing up the HAL and not seeing the same people week in week out. That said, agree that it might make sense to limit the squad to having 2-3 people per club. 

Yeah I think the only way you can do this and not destroy any goodwill is by limiting it to a maximum of two players from each team and perhaps U23's from the A-League only. Combine that with Asian based players who have finished their seasons and fringe Euro players and I believe we can still send a competitive squad.

It is mostly only for domestically based players. I remember last time we tried to call up Josh Kennedy who was playing in Japan and the club wouldn't release him. All HAL clubs would be equally affected over time so big deal. The squad should have a strong emphasis on youth anyway and I'm sure the HAL can do some creative scheduling. 

Even in the recent Suzuki Cup,   some of the Philipine and Thai players had to return to the clubs after the group stage.  Probably a pre agreement between club and country

As long as we don't send our best squad it sounds like a good idea.

It wouldn't be ideal to win the comp either, we don't really belong in it and it would only be good to give fringe players exposure to international football. Winning it would piss off the rest of the teams who would see the tournament as purely a SE Asian tournament 

:D:w00t:

The reality is we need a confederation. The Europeans have the League of Nations now so we shouldn't be expecting too many friendlies with them anymore.  We don't want to go back to Oceania because the weakest confederation will drag us down. I don't think too strong a relationship with the West Asians is ideal for many reasons. The obvious choice going forward is close relations with the East Asians. With the League of Nations the Europeans have basically said we're going to look after each other in this confederation.  We should do the same with the East Asians. Japan and S Korea are in the exact same boat as us struggling to find similar competition. We need to form close ties with the Vietnamese and Thais on many levels and then the rest of East Asia. Asia is a really big place so I think a more localised option is possible. Most importantly we must fully commit. Not some half arsed we're just here because we can't beat Uruguay approach.

Except we do belong in Southeast Asia as we are part of the AFC and that is our region of the AFC. For all intents and purposes Australia is much closer to being an Asian country than we are to Oceania.  

Yea put that stupid and arrogant thought away please.
You are saying as if we could win the Asian trophy easily.
Senior team went to WC through inter-continential play-offs, could not even get a win over the past 2 World Cup tournaments, got humiliated by Jordan and the UAE, struggled against Syria and Uzbek in recent Asian Cup while junior teams kept being defeated by the Viets and now there are still people like you who think we are sitting at the top in Asia, how ridiculous.

We belong in it. We're part of the SEA group within the AFC. The others being West Asia, Central Asia, South Asia and East Asia. 

I just feel that because the teams in SE Asia  have not and might not ever qualify for a world cup and the Suzuki cup is their version of it that they might prefer it to be a tournament for SE Asians to play in. 

We're pretty much a European team in Asia, if we were to somehow win it I think they would rather we fuck off and play somewhere else. 

Like I said they don't have a world cup to look forward to and this is their tournament.

The Suzuki cup hardly means anything to us but for them it's their world cup. 

I just think it could potentially backfire on us if we managed to win it. I really don't think they would be happy if we did and we would hardly give a shit about winning it either compared to them. 

I wouldn't be so confident about us winning, we've had enough problems against Thailand with our full team, let alone with who'll be available.

In any case, I've already banged on here that involvement in the Suzuki Cup could be even more resonant in Australia than the Asian Cup, against real countries that Joe Aussie can actually find on the map let alone the large local populations from those countries here that would certainly turn up, in contrast to Bahrain v Qatar lighting up our home Asian Cup. We didn't even face a country from the Eastern half of the AFC this time around.

Broadcasters might be cold on the A-League and 3am Asian Cup games in the Middle East, but home competitive games for the Green and Gold against countries their audience has actually heard of and away games at friendly hours would probably have them pretty keen.

Agree. Imagine if we take either Vietnam or Thailand or Indonesia at our home in Sydney or Melb, we can see a huge flow of their fans turning up. For sure the Viets and the Indos will not let the stadium quite, considering the fact that there are hundred thousands of their people living here in Aus.

I'd say Vietnam and Thailand would be competitive. If we field a HAL based side, we will get a run for our money. 

I hope the perceived superiority was not from us. That would just be sheer arrogance.

Personally I would like to sent the Under 19s or Ollyroos. It makes more sense than sending A league players who when a squad is announced would not even get a look in to a starting position  

Our full strength side would get a run for their money. Thailand outplayed us when we played away to them in qualifying, while Vietnam with an incredibly young squad seem to be a better side based on recent results. We might not win it full strength, we probably won't win with a full HAL squad.

U16 Aussie - U16 Vietnam : 2-3 in 2016
U19 Aussie - U19 Vietnam : 1-5 in 2014 and 0-1 in 2014 also
U23 Aussie - U23 Vietnam : 0-1 in 2018
Therefore, I dont think sending our U19 to face their Senior team is a good idea if you dont want our young player get humiliated, tbh.

Very true.

Well I think having them play high quality competitive competition will help their development and actually assist in the Olympics qualifying, no? Obviously our under 19s wouldn't win it

@Davide82

But deep down you know I'm right.

Something something effnik something something Nuevo dawn fraser

Do you think sending U19s is such a disrespect to SE Nations?

I can't believe I'm reading this from a supposed football fan who  participates in an Aussie football forum!

Outside the World Cup , the Asian Cup is the biggest event  that Aus plays in.

Agree, against Aus at full strength .

In recent times, they've caught up to us, whilst we have such a weakness in the attacking third .