Yeah true and Leckie of all is the one who should've been converted to a right back. Italiano can do both. Peupion is really small physically and has to starting full out. He needs a full EFL season next. 

Most just within the age eligibility. Occasionally they pick very junior squads due to the abundance of talent. Not going to have a deep look but I wonder how many of this cohort play J League regularly and how many have been together since the u17. A force to be reckoned with no doubt yet they may finish 1st or 2nd in there group or if the crazy does happen, bomb out. We can't pick our knock out opponent so we've just got to be ready for whoever. 

We need RB's! 

anyone have a link to Japan and South koreas' u23 team?

whole drama feels like world cup qualification in the 90s and early 00s again 

Haven't seen  the entire  thread on Olympic selection, but Tony Vidmar stated today in the Murdoch media, he didn't  want  to put more pressure on  Irankunda by selecting him in the Olympic qualifiers, because he is only 18 and was quite intense, implying he is a worrier.

As a corollary,  TV adds that Irankunda will be a long term star for the senior Socceroos.

I'm a big fan of Irankunda too.

One SK/Japan bombing out in the group stage would be music to my ears. but yeah even third place in that group is going to be tough. Play who's in front of us

I'd take him as a RB, that's fair. Definitely not as a winger though. 

After having a look at the squad selected I have a rough first eleven.

Some of the players selected I'd definitely select in a first eleven. - Jake Hollman, Farrell and Toure.

A rotating midfield triangle in a 4-3-3 - which is  what Viddie has played to date.



...........................The thin faced Keeper

Italiano...............  Perkins............Natta............Farrell

......................................Teague
................ Jake Hollman
...............................................Segecic

Garang Kuol................Toure......................Milanovic


If available Circati would walk into R CB.

Ditto Nieuwenhof at 6 or DM instead of Teague.

I'll bet Vidmar  opts for D'arrigo as a DM. He is a   strong tackler , but isn't good enough on the ball for the current standards  as a distributor. Viddie will  probably play Jake H as  number 10 or AM.

Bos could play LW if available, but he isn't scoring goals like Milanovic.

Can't  find a pace for Yazbek and Yengi - now  senior Socceroos.  Nieuw is better at what Yazbek does.

Toure was electric as a central striker in the U23 games I've seen! 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Korea_national_under-23_football_team

Japan's is on their X page, they haven't updated it on wikipedia yet

Probably swap jcp for a specialist like popavic

Wonder how much rotating there will be? It is still a very formidable side with some electric subs available

I mean Yengi is too old for the U23's. 
Robertson, Bos, Volpato, Circati, Triantis, Nieuwenhof and Irankunda would walk right into the starting lineup without a doubt. I can't imagine wasting Bos as LW, he is a much better LB. They should all be available for the Olympics (jury is out on Volpato and Irankunda) so we will have a decent team.

I agree with your lineup pretty much, JCP or JGR. Girdwood-Reich would be the safer option as JCP is mostly playing LB these days. I like Tilio but he can't play a full 90 and Milanovic is in form so I would pick him. Garang is pretty undersized on one side and you don't want to be weaker on both wings, Milanovic offers some brute force. 

Though, I should acknowledge Vidmar's favourites like D'Arrigo, Brook, Alou and Velupillay I could all see in the starting lineup. Realistically, perhaps against more attacking teams you go defensive with the D'Arrigo's and Brook's of the world and against teams like Indonesia you go full attack with Garang, Toure, Tilio etc because you can imagine a few counter-attacks being given to us. 

Anyways, I'm going through an Olyroos binge watch to recollect some thoughts on previous performances. I thought I had a decent understanding of a lineup but the WAFF tournament threw me off. I really liked Youlley, he gave us such pace and quick decisiveness in midfield. I wouldn't be surprised to see him work himself into the starting lineup. 

can you link to the twitter? Can't find it (the jfa_en doesn't have it)

I thought Aus outplayed SK in  the AFF final, with nowhere near a first eleven on the pitch.

With Farrell and Teague coming into the  squad after  injuries it  makes a big difference.

4 years ago this is the team we played against South korea in a losing semi (we were convincingly beaten)

-----------------------Glover--------------------------
-cleur---dylan ryan----Tass Mourdakoutas--gersbach-
-----------------o'niell--baccus----------------------------------
-----------------------metcalf------------------------------------
-al hassan toure---buhagier-----j italiano-----------------

At the time it was a significantly better u23 side than any I'd seen before with the current blowing it out the water and the younger players being better again. Looks like they couldn't get mcgree to play in the qualifiers. I want to compare the progress by comparing decentric's xi perhaps with popa instead of jcp

Cleur: 4 years ago played 800 minutes in the most recent season for seri c which seems as high as he had played up to that point
vs Italiano: has 20 games this season for 2 goals in the german 4th division. On paper Cleur looks slightly better though bovalina is better on paper than either of them

Advantage, 2020

Ryan: 4 years ago yet to make a senior appearance but was on the books in the eredivisie. Still only 23 and has started 7 games for relegation threatened fc Den
natta: played 70 games so far with 25 in the current season and a fotmob rating of 6.6. 

Advantage, 2024

Tass: 4 years ago played 25 games in total for wsw scoring 2 goals, the season before the u23 asian cup he played 13 games which was his best to that point with a fotmob rating of 6.2
popa: has 50 senior appearances, his current season shared between the a league and k league where his fotmob rating is 6.9 and 6.8 respectively

Advantage, 2024

Gersbach: Had a resume that really looked like he was destined for the big 5. By that stage of his career he played 32 games for sfc, 58 games for rosenborg, 14 games for lens, 7 games in the eredivisie and 5 games in denmark in his most recent season with a fotmob rating of 6.1 for the season before the u23 asian cup. Unfortunately his decline had cemented in by this stage
Farrel: 84 games and one of the absolute standouts in the a league this season with 3 goals 5 assists and a fotmob rating of 7.7. So impressive has he been that if we had bos I'd be tempted to play bos at lw

Advantage: 2024

O'niell: Had a bunch of lower division english games and had returned to the a league. His career hadn't quite taken off yet as he played 18 games for the roar with a fotmob rating of 6.8
Teague: His 2nd season of senior football, unless you count 27 games in the portrugese 2nd division (I believe, getting confused by his record, please fact check).He has been quite strong with a fotmob rating of 7.1, 1 goal and an assist

Advantage 2024

Baccus: career had just started taking off and had 67 games in the a league before the tournament with a fotmob rating of 7.1 in the season before the game
J Hollman: Another standout in the a league this season, 8 goals and 2 assists in all competitions and a fotmob of 7.2 He has 82 games in his career so far

Advantage 2024

Metcalf: had played 28 a league games with a fotmob rating of 6.6 and 3 goals + 4 assists in the season before the tournament
Segecic: 3 goals and an assist in the ereste divisie for a team chasing promotion. He also has a fotmob rating of 6.8. For his entire career he has 55 senior games. Hard to split this one

Advantage: draw

Al Hassan: 7 goals and 2 assists with a fotmob of 6.3 in 17 games
Milanovic: 8 goals and 4 assists in a breakout season. Also has a fotmob rating of 7.5 showing how strong he is in linkup play and defence. Has 76 career games. This isn't a close call

Advantage: 2024

Buhagier: 3 goals 2 assists with a fotmob of 6.1 in 20 games, all up had played 75 games
Mo Toure: Injuries has struck him so he has only had 10 games with a goal and an asisst this season for a fotmob rating of 6.5. However he is playing in ligue 2 which is higher than the a league and has played 3 ligue 1 games and 44 a league games where he scored 7 goals. Don't think this is close either, despite injuries has a higher fotmob rating in a better league

Advantage 2024

J italiano: had left perth early after playing 19 games (fotmob rating of 5.2 in last season). His season before the tournament he played 14 games and got 2 goals
G kuol: the other irankunda has scored against rangers this season and started 8 games in the eredivisie at the youngest age for an aussie since bret holman. Also got a goal and an assist, things have gone a bit pair shaped since the club imploded in the most spectacular way. They now park the bus, play without wingers. In any case he has 22 games in the a league, 7 goals and 4 assists as well as in the last 15 months 25 euro games with 2 goals and an assist. His current fotmob rating is 6.3. Despite the chaos this also isn't close

Advantage 2024

So 8 outfield players are better in 2024 than 2020 with 1 draw and 1 position that is better in 2020

in 2020 we had some euroroos too in mcgree, and souttar (any others)

safe to say our missing euro roos these days are a step up too

Next looking at south korea:

they played in the waff final. 

Jyunsoo Byun (y no senior appearances)
Hyun Taek Cho  (y, 16 total k league appearances, doesn't seem to have a fotmob profile)
Youngjun Lee (y, 2 k league games fotmob of 6.1, last season got 13 games, 3 goals 2 assists and a fotmob of 6.6)
Kanghee Lee (y, no senior apperances)
Jisung Eom (y, 4 matches this year in k league, no fotmob rating, played 53 in total)
Sanghoon Paik (y, fc seoul, 2 games fotmob of 6.1)
Siyoung Jang (y, ulsan hyundai, no senior appearances)
HyunJun Yang (y, celtic, 22 matches, fotmob of 6.8
SeongJin Kang (y, fc seoul 3 matches fotmob of 6.7)
Jisoo Kim (y, brentford but no appearances, played 20 games for a relegated k league squad last year)

(y) denotes they were selected for the u23 asian cup

Now for players not in the first 11 we have

Lee Tae-seok fc seoul with 63 senior appearnaces and a fotmob of 6.93 a standout
Hwang Jae-won 52 senior appearances for daegu, no fotmob rating
Palik Sang-hoon 28 total games for fc seoul. No games this year and only 2 last year for a fotmob rating of 6.1
Hong Yun-Sang: no fotmob profile but has played 2 k league games
jeong Sang-bin: 5 matches in the mls so far with a fotmob rating of 6.9. A standout
Kang Sang-yoon 20 k league games in his career, 4 games this season and a fotmob rating of 6.6
An Jae-jun: only played k2 so no fotmob data


So clearly from the xi we faced they can stengthen it with Lee-Tae-Seok and Jeong Sang-bin but the team was close to their best xi

will be an interesting matchup

They've seen us play and have seen what we can do, I'd expect a much different Korea team if we played them again. That's the coaches speciality. A one off game like that is too small of a sample size to expect them to get dominated again. Don't underestimate.

Rewatching the SK WAFF u23 game and man, Milanovic was excellent

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japan_national_under-23_football_team

Ah nice they finally updated it. Looks a bit stronger than south koreas squad

Celtic have rejected Yang Hyun-Jun's call-up for South Korea. He is being replaced. So South Korea have lost one of their best players

Wow huge. Qatar is then a big game as i think we are slight favourites against south korea without their best player

Just realized something depressing. It is probably impossible to further improve our olyroos squad in the furture unless we raise the a league salary cap as any player better rhan what we currenrly have goes to europe before they can play for us

The A-League is still producing a lot of good talent, and it seems like the talent is starting to develop and stay in the A-League a little longer. Definitely some of the bigger players will leave but I think the A-League overall U23 talent will improve as well. Not to mention 2026 U23 Asian Cup isn't an Olympic qualifier so it isn't as important to have every single U23 eligible Australia, it's just a tournament to test the A-League's best talent and a launching pad for said players. Plus the last U23 Asian Cup was in June 2022 during the off-season so that'll help with player eligibility. 

Realistically, it is going to be a problem we face at not only senior, u23, u20 but even u17 level. I think it's reasonable to think we won't have many players at the U17 and U20 Asian cup quals later this year and the tournament proper. We have lots of Europeans players in these age groups and it keeps on increasing but it's also great for the NT because it shows how much a lot of these players mean to their respective club. 

In the end, all these youth teams are pathways for the NT and even if they don't play for these age-groups as long as they play for the NT then I think it's fine. 

Marco Tilio picked up a minor quad injury during the week which may rule him out of the U23 Asian Cup. Not sure yet but may or may not. If it does, they'll need a fast replacement, more likely to be bringing an extra CB or maybe somebody like Raphael Borges-Rodrigues. 

Would be unfortunate if we lost Tilio, but no confirmation as of yet. Himself and Toure have been very injury prone. It's never quite worked out for them around these camp periods.

Sounds minor from twitter. Hope he plays as he is a real weapon

Does sound minor but it was also reported on the broadcast officially and they said he may miss the U23 Asian Cup.

Crap that sux

https://x.com/joeylynchy/status/1776581497547296769

crisis averted for now

laught if irankunda is the replacement

rodriguez of course is very decent

Talk about breaks poor Tilio he can’t catch a break if he is ruled out, at least he’s young and we got decent talent to choose to select from to replace him.