Schwarzer's message to critics

Australia goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer says the Socceroos are on a mission to prove the doubters wrong at the 2010 FIFA World Cup in South Africa.

The team left Melbourne, bound for Johannesburg, on a chartered jet emblazoned with the Socceroos logo on Wednesday, after an official farewell ceremony in a Qantas maintenance hangar.

Schwarzer, one of many veterans of Australia's historic 2006 campaign in Germany still with the squad, said heading to a second World Cup was equally exciting.

"If you don't get excited about days like today, you'll never get excited about football or in life in general," he said.

Having passed the group stage in 2006 in Australia's first World Cup appearance since 1974, before being eliminated by eventual champions Italy in the second round, the pressure is on the Socceroos to at least equal that effort in South Africa.

But Schwarzer said rather than feeling weight of expectations, the squad felt there were many critics who gave them scant hope of emerging from a tough group - comprising Germany, Ghana and Serbia - this time.

"A lot of people have already written us off and people continue writing us off," Schwarzer said before boarding the plane.

"That's something you get used to ... over the years we've had to deal with that.

"In a way, I think we're going to go there with the expectation probably not as high as people thought it would be.

"We're happy enough with that, we're happy to go there and be able to hopefully show people that they were wrong."

Schwarzer said the theory that the Socceroos would rely on the starting team they fielded in Germany, minus then-captain Mark Viduka and with the other players four years older, was basically correct.

But he said that was not necessarily a negative.

"That is factual, yes, we are four years older, but with that comes experience as well," Schwarzer said.

"Guys potentially are even in better form and better shape in their career than they ever were. There's different ways you can put a spin on it.

"Obviously we're all looking at it in a very positive way and we're all very confident amongst ourselves that we won't let people down ... we believe we're good enough to prove the critics wrong."

Schwarzer said he was also out to prove wrong those who felt his own career might be set to wind down, saying he was in career-best form and wanted to "defy logic" with his age and remain at the top level for some time.

While he missed Monday night's scrappy 2-1 win over New Zealand in Melbourne with a thumb fracture, he had no doubt he would be fit for the World Cup.

"I'll start training by the end of the week at the latest," he said.

Coach Pim Verbeek and captain Lucas Neill both told the assembled audience they would do the nation proud.

"Let's hope we can have another emotional rollercoaster of excitement like the last journey was," Neill said.

The Socceroos play warm-up matches against Denmark on 1 June and the US on 5 June, ahead of their opening World Cup match against Germany in Durban on 14 June.

http://theworldgame.sbs.com.au/socceroos/news/1004102/Schwarzer-s-message-to-Socceroos-critics