Australia vs Uruguay – 2005

With the second leg of Australia’s World Cup qualifier against Uruguay only an hour or so away, I thought I should comment about the weekend match and make a prediction about tonights match.

First… the first leg…

1. Harry Kewell should have been removed in the first 10 minutes… he’s now favourite for an Emmy or an Oscar with his antics… pathetic… 10 months out with injury, little to no strength left, little to no match practice… all he had left was his diving skills… made me sick!
2. 1-0 is NOT a good result. It’s a BAD one… sure it’s better than the 3-0 they had last time, but that doesn’t make it good.
3. The Australian’s were lucky to only lose 1-0. Sure they had some half chances in the first half, and they were the better side for the first 35 minutes, but Uruguay were always a threat in the air, and were unlucky not to repeat the 3-0 of 4 years ago.
4. The free kick that Uruguay scored from was dodgy, but there were at least two fouls inside the box which were deserving of a penalty.

Now… tonight’s match… while I wouldn’t go as far as Charlie Yankos in saying Australia were a 50/50 chance of qualifying, I’d give them a fair chance…. perhaps a 40% chance at best… AT BEST! But that said, I’m going to say Australia will win 2-0… what can I say… why? Perhaps it’s because I’m an optimist when it comes to football in Australia… but I rationalise it this way… in the past, Australia have been in a good position after the first leg, and have suffered from Greg Norman’s disease (i.e. chocking when they were ahead and the pressure was on), but this time, they’ll need to work for it and I think they have the ability…

Gee, I hope they don’t prove me wrong… for the sake of football in this country.

[Update: 11:50pm]
WE WON!!!!

Sure it wasn’t 2-0 as I predicted, but we won nonetheless… my nerves are shot and I have no fingernails left, but WE’RE GOING TO THE WORLD CUP!!!!

In short…

Mark Schwarzer – BRILLIANT!! In my opinion… you deserve the man-of-the-match.
Harry Kewell – BRILLIANT!! Amazing what a difference it makes when you stay on your feet and play the game instead of playing for the free kick.
Mark Viduka – BRILLIANT!! The new captain socceroo…
Guus Hiddink – ABSOLUTELY BRILLIANT!!! Australia thanks you… Australia LOVES you!!!
The rest of the team – BRILLIANT!!!

Finally… a big thank you to John Safran for his trip to Mozambique last year to have the curse on Australian soccer lifted… BRILLIANT!!!

While talking football… a slight aside – if Trinidad and Tobago are able to beat Bahrain today, I’ll have three teams to support at Germany 2006 (Australia, Ukraine and Trinidad)… much better than the usual ZERO teams and being forced to adopt a team… go Soca Warriors!