I don't think Australia were clearly the better team at all, although they should be. Culina was pretty much invisible in the first half, it was as if he had been subbed on at half time.
In any case you can't read too much into games like this. It is not unusual for good teams to look ordinary three weeks out and then turn up at the World Cup and produce the goods.


What do you think about the FourFourTwo article Culina: We Deserved Win?
EXCLUSIVE: Jason Culina said the Socceroos were the better team after scraping a last gasp 2-1 victory over New Zealand on Monday night.

Have your say.

Pretty even game in truth. A draw couldn't really have drawn too much complaint.

we made them look like a better side in the first half with some god awful football.

the second half was better but still not up to standard...culina was awful in the first half but did fairly well in the second

Clearly the better team ??. lol

Also to the Australian fans (just the cunt ones, as seen in the other comments for the match thread)

Nobody expected New Zealand to win.. so stop acting like "haha we rule, you suck" .. you are ranked.. 60 ? or something places above us?

If we were hacking at your players like you did to bertos... didnt get anyone sent off for it... won the game in the 4th minute of 3 minutes of extra .. you would be FUMING..

It was a messy game all around... dont think you can read much into this game ..

But seriously, some of the views from some people here are pathetic.. we are both small fish in a big sea going to the world cup.. we should be together.. not "HAHAHA YOUR GONNA GET DESTROYED BY ITALY" ... ps we played them last year and it was 2-3. (Again this is just a post for the cunt posters.. not the good ones)

Good luck to Australia in the world cup :)

Culina, you were the better side in the second half yes, you woke up and we went to sleep. First half on the other hand was completely different when we were the better side, a very even game all round and should have ended in a draw, what a heart breaking finish.

Good luck in the world cup Australia, you will need as will we. Neither side is good enough to qualify for the second round.

Poor Bertos

Jason Culina you are a chip of the block... your old man is nuts too.

does this mean we can now say things like... you are going to get destroyed by Germany? LOL

to be honest you should be the better team against New Zealand... a difference of around 40-50 rankings suggest so.

Awful performance, I wanted to pour acid in my eyes during the first half. If Pim's aim is to bore the Australian football public into submission, then it sure is working. Playing 1 up front is useless unless they get support, and until the introduction of Holman there was no support. We will be a laughing stock if we play like this in SA, NZ were the far more positive team in attack and at least deserved a draw.

Aussie deserved the loss, perhaps the draw given the better second half.

But again and like is always under Verbeek, we won, get bragging rights and did it in the worst way possible.... but it's the win that counts

look at the positives:

Australia at its worst v NZ at its best. 2-1 win.

though Serbia, Ghana and Germany will not be so forgiving with chances on goal. Rory Fallon had a top game and made our defense look ordinary.

and for Culina to say this, well, i dont know who he's trying to fool.

Sure your were, here take your clozapine and I'll see you in the morning.

WE may have been the better team, Jason, but YOU were bloody WOEFUL.

new Zealand won the first half,
australia won the second half
football wasnt a winner last night......the rest of the world would be laughing this morning if they saw our performance........

If anything, this further proves that Australia is one of the hardest teams to bear. I have no idea why some people are so shocked at this...We do it time and time again, it's part of the team.
I'd rather be able to win like this when we play in the World Cup, than play amazingly and lose.

Australia could not have played much worse in the first half so probably deserved a draw at best. Obviously it doesn't work like that. Anyway the result is not that important. Addressing our problems before the WC kicks off next month is the main thing.

ned7, were you watching mate? Culina was one of our best, if not the best. Obviously his first half was shite, it was the same for the whole team. Culina's first half rating = 5/10, second half rating = 9/10 ... so so 14/20 isn't bad at all. You clearly weren't at the game coz his work rate in the second half was top notch, was the spark we needed going forward and actually provided an attacking option

Australia were not the better team. Better in the second half, but that first half was so bad I can't see many positives for them. I do love it how they mention Aus coming to life in the second half as the Kiwi's went to sleep - coincides reasonably well with when a few Kiwi's got kicked off the park in a very cunning Australian strategy of desperation (looking at you Grella).

So no, this wasn't NZ's best side vs Australia's 2nd side and Aussie one so it's a good sign. Australia will struggle at this rate in all three of their World Cup games while I'm happy to say if NZ can replicate their first half against Slovakia I'd even be confident of a win.

Forgot to mention, this is further proof that a Kiwi side could fare reasonably well in Asia. Might not win the thing, but they'd be competitive.

first mistake was allowing them to play out from the back. you let the Cook Islands do this, and eventually they'll look dangerous.

Bollocks. He didnt play a single ball forward to the feet of our strikers, spent too much time hanging out on the wing getting caught in posession and having to play the ball back to his defence. Our strikers had to end up coming deep to get the ball themselves so by the time the ball made it into the box there was no one there on the end of it. He only looked better in the second half because he didnt have Cahill there doing the work for him.

Fair call, his crosses were pretty rubbish. I guess I was more impressed with his running, he really worked hard down the right side and I suppose compared to his first half any performance would have looked better! Don't think he was woeful though

A draw would have been the fair result. NZ better 1st half, Aus better 2nd half. If I had to pick one I'd say Roos 2nd half was marginally better than NZ's 1st half.

All the kiwis commenting about how much better NZ were and how Australia are going to struggle at the WC are delusional. I think one of the few positives last night was that the quality of the Aussie players was highlighted against the NZ squad. The sharpness, movement, ball control and technical skill shown by the Aussies was far superior to what the kiwis could ever serve up. It's only a matter of time before the Aussie team as a whole gets their ass into gear.

You gotta be kidding yourself if you think the Aussies are going to struggle like the Kiwi's through the WC.

junak... i agree that the aussies are better players.. they are also better hackers and will be out of the world cup one day before NZ...

It's hard to gauge what will happen in the world cup from this game, Australia were terrible last night and New Zealand were up and down aswell.

As I've said before this was the wrong game to lead up to a world cup for both teams, the positive thing that did come through is that weaknesses were shown up on both sides so something to work on.

If the Kiwi's forward line are able to have a little more control by foot they could cause some problems and if the Aussies can learn how to play against larger forwards they will be fine.

Haha, we rule. You suck. Suck shit.

I don't know how anyone could possibly blame Pim for the first half performance, when so many of the players were just not up to scratch...

However the fact that New Zealand struggled to even get possession of the ball once the Roos had sorted themselves out a bit in the 2nd half, suggests to me that Jason is probably right...

Put it this way, if NZ had of won, would that have been a fair result? I think not.

There are a few issues that worry me with what I am seeing with Pim at the moment

1. I don't think Pim is driven enough: (a) he is quoted a few days ago as saying “friendships” were the most important thing in his career……..hello….what about "success". (b) he is going to morrocco to work in the youth system after the cup. Hardly the sign of a man trying to establish himself as a world class coach…more like an admission that he doesn't have what it takes.

2. I think the first choice 11, are too comfortable with him. They know they will start and Pim is buddy buddy with them all. They need to have credible threats to their postions which pim should re-enforce. Like Guus where everyone had to fight.

But Pim has no incentive to go down this path. Why should Pim upset his start players and go the hard way? He’s got himself another job allready that doesn't depend on his performance at the world cup? Incentives are all misaligned.

It doesn’t look good for South Africa

Nah mate probably having a giggle at full strength Potugal drawing 0-0 with powerhouse Cape Verde!

@Iinnerwestie and Pims favourites. Heard on the radio his comments about Cahill and Grella's tackles. Something along the lines of it being not acceptable and that if he selects these players he needs to know that he can depend on them otherwise they are no goo d to him. He won't drop Cahill, but I reckon Grella hasn't done himself any good in Verbeek's eyes.

Overall the first half showed just how bad a decision it was to not select Ogga. Who is gonna go up against Zigic, Ivanovic and Vidic when the set piece crosses/corners come in? Ditto Gomez and Klose. Beauchamp?

how about we look at it this way. we subbed off our big guns, put on a few rookie'ish players and then produced 2 goals to win the game. that's a very good sign in terms of squad depth