Lebanese duval drums at WS Stadium > Lebanese duval drums at Stadium Australia
Pluuuus, safe standing for Australia Active.
They got the home game against Bangladesh, which hopefully is enough of a message to the great unwashed there.
The AFL is the government down there.
Marvel is a poor ground for football anyway, only slightly better than the MCG and Accor.
AAMI is a far better ground, just small capacity.
Reality is the AFL paid a lot of money for Marvel, and it’s extremely important for their schedule. Home ground for five teams and typically hosts 50+ games over the shortish 5.5 months season.
If Football wants to hire it for a FIFA tournament with its bump in and clean ground policies, the tournament is going to have to be in September to March.
Mat(t)hew Ryan out for about a month with a fractured jaw/cheeckbone.
Doubts he’ll be ready for Asian Cup.
Dont think we could have a bigger out than that.
No only is he the captain with heaps of experience and playing well at a good level but theres no clear replacement. Redders is too out of form. Next gen of Glover/Maynard-Brewer/Gauci have about 2 caps between them. And the experience of Langerak/Vukovic is retired (do we get one out of retirement for the tournament only?). Big decisions for Arnie.
As far as captaincy goes, I’d assume Irvine takes the armband. That just makes sense to me.
For the goalkeepers… Pavlesic in?
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No way Andrew Redmayne is getting back into the squad. Especially after his howler against Macarthur. Vukovic seems to have hit the same wall that Redmayne has.
Tom Glover’s only made 3 or 4 appearances for Middlesborough in the League Cup, and hasn’t been great in those games.
Joe Gauci hasn’t been terrible for Adelaide, but it’ll be a massive step up to be the #1 for Australia. Ashley Maynard-Brewer is doing OK for Charlton, but again, a massive step up and leap of faith.
Is it too late to cap Jamie Young. He seems to kill it in the A-league (especially against us).
I suppose Lawrence Thomas is an option. He’s been alright throughout his career.
Geez, even a grovelling call to Langerak is gonna land right in the J-League’s off season.
It’s almost like we maybe could have given someone other than Ryan a few runouts over the last year in case this happened
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I would begrudgingly accept Lawrence Thomas. He’s been in Roos camps before (and spent time in Europe), his team have conceded the fewest goals so far this season, does know his way around the dark arts required at international level.
Hopefully if Ryan is almost fit he can wear 1 of those cool see thru protective masks like the dudes in the NBA do sometimes
Is it beyond Arnold to call up Rhyan Grant in goals? He’s proven.
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I’d call Lawrence Thomas up.
Not to play him, just so Wests don’t have him for 5 weeks. He’s been the form keeper in the league for the past 18 months
I’m not completely sold on Gauci but if Ryan will be for the latter games then I’d go with him.
I’ve not seen anything of Maynard-Brewer to be able to make a call either way.
He can have a lovely chianti at half time with the opposition striker
As a cannibal I always expected him to better taste in wine. A nice barolo goes better with heavy meat dishes.
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He looks great at times but then regularly seems to have moments where he looks like one of these…
In other words, a keeper of A-League level.
You’d think Gauci and Maynard-Brewer will absolutely be going, based on recent squads. I’d pick Thomas as the third keeper. Not only does it take Thomas away from Western Suburbs for a month, but he’s a bit older and might have a better chance of handling the pressure of a big tournament.
I wouldn’t take Redmayne, as he’s not even good enough for A-League on current form. Last time I checked, Glover and Birighitti aren’t playing overseas, so should not be selected.
Matt Leckie has done his hamstring again and will miss the Asian Cup.
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