Socceroos Squad for Poland and Switzerland.

Socceroos Squad for Poland and Switzerland.

Includes our boy North (something that doesn't seem to please many people).

http://au.fourfourtwo.com/news/181244,holger-names-his-heroes.aspx

This is a real worry.  Ricki said after the CCM game that North would be available to face Perth on Sunday September 5.  However, these games are on the following dates so he's obviously not going to be...

Switzerland v Qantas Socceroos
3 September 2010
Kick-off 8:15pm CEST (4:15am AEST, 3:45am ACST, 2:15am AWST)
AFG Arena, St Gallen, Switzerland

 

Poland v Qantas Socceroos
7 September 2010
Kick-off 8:30pm CEST (4:30am AEST, 4:00am ACST, 2:30am AWST)
Wisla Krakow Stadium, Krakow, Poland

Is North ever actually going to play with us? Getting kind of ridiculous.

His form for Aus is a bit sh*t.  Reasonable chance he may not get the call ?

They really are a bit sh*t aren't they ?

Take Cahill away and the only decent player is a 110 year old keeper.

F**ks sake! At least he's still contracted to TIL, so aren't paying him yet.

Don't forget he could well be in Qatar playing Asian Cup in January, meaning he could be out for another 3 or 4 matches as well. Could hurt us, as there's only 2 other A-League players in this next squad.

Know your feelings, but if they were Kiwis they would all get in the AW's.

No they wouldn't.  North wouldn't make the All Whites.  Beauchamp, Burns, Valeri unlikely.

North > Boyens. North > Sigmund. North > Old. Burns > Brockie. Burns > Fallon. Valeri > Mulligan. Valeri > Christie.

No it's not. 

The Heart defence is worse than ours so Beachamp couldn't be counted ahead of Sigmund, let alone Nelsen, Reid or Smith.  Likewise North, he can't get a game in Norway in a competition lower than all our backs play in (apart from Siggy), basically similar to where Jack Pelter was in Sweden and no one would consider selecting him.

Burns is all hype not actual delivery, last season he was playing in some hick team in Cyprus.  Better up front that Killen, Smeltz, Rory or Wood ? Johnny Foundalakis used to play at the level, it's nothing.

Likewise Valeri, Z-Grade in Italy.

My NZ/Aus combined team would be:
Schwarzer
Jones
Federici
Nelsen
Reid
Neill
Spiranovic
Emerton
Wilkshire
Cahill
Kewell
Holman
Vidosic
Carney
Smeltz
Killen
McDonald
Fallon/Kennedy - can't decide
18 man squad.
Fringe would be Bertos, Culina, Valeri, Fallon/Kennedy.
Australia dominates that in goalkeeping and midfield in particular.

Neill ahead of Smith  ? No thanks.

Durante is better than Sigmund, and he doesn't make the Socceroos squad. Jack Pelter was playing second division in Norway!! Which is a complete different thing. The team North plays for just had a defender sign for Shalke, their right back starts for Norway, and a centre back plays for Finland. They may not start but all the guys you mentioned would walk in to the All Whites squad.

As for the Heart's defense is worse than ours comment, well you've got Durante to thank for that. Colosimo and Beauchamp are better than Sigmund, End of.

Burns was quality for AEK Athens in the Sydney festival of football. Better than Fallon easily. Fallon is so one dimensional.Luis Garcia2010-08-24 22:29:59

I don't agree.  Beachamp and North = to Siggy but with less spine.
Hard News2010-08-24 22:29:27

At least they have pace. Something Sigmund lacks plenty of. The fact is you stated none of those four would make the "All Whites" But your whole argument is if they'd start. Clearly we have strong defense. But they are miles ahead of our fringe players. Look at it this way, Sigmund, Old, Boyens, Christie, Fallon, Mulligan, Brockie, Barbaroseus, Brown, Paston, Moss all wouldn't make the Socceroos.

What use is pace if they can't time a tackle or control a ball vaguely ?

None of those I mentioned would make my Socceroo side and there's no point in discussing keepers, I'm the one who got shot down for saying our best wouldn't make Australia's top 20 (subsequently changed to top 15).  Incidentally Fallon is pretty much Josh Kennedy just one is fixated with jesus, the other just looks like him..

I stand by my view that the four players I mentioned are not better than an 18 man All Whites squad.  They might make a 23 but not an 18 or 20 for friendlies.

All you need to do is look for the history of the words 'next Hary Kewell' to sum up how far Australia have fallen.
Hard News2010-08-24 22:40:41

I think you mean fantastic performances by the All Whites defence. We've parked the bus against everyone except Australia so far this year.

Our performance against Italy was fantastic. Bus or no bus.

Paston and the central defenders were fantastic against Italy. If our midfield had been fantastic, Italy wouldn't have had so many shots.

What the AWs achieved in South Africa was fantastic, but I'm sick of everyone fapping themselves to the point where they believe the whole side played like champions. We never looked like scoring against Slovakia (until we did of course, when we were throwing men forward), scored from a set-piece agianst Italy, were totally toothless against Paraguay, and were constantly losing the midfield battle.

StopOut2010-08-25 00:45:21

HN, know you love Siggy, but I think you're overestimating his ability.

Norwegian league is much better than the Swedish one these days, the Cypriot league's improved leaps and bounds in the last 10 years.

And I'll leave my contribution to this debate at that.

No.  If Jon McKain was there I wouldn't make the claim.  I just think beauchamp and North aren't in Australia's bext and therefore aren't near our best.

Sigmund isn't the best defender in the league. If there's Australians better than him in the league but can't make the Socceroos, doesn't that make North better? or it just means A-League players are still getting overlooked for selection. Beauchamp looked good at the World Cup.

I've just written down the centre backs in this league and I can't think of many I'd rather have.  A few at a similar level to Siggy, a couple that have been better but aren't currently and maybe one or two I'd have ahead of him.

Here's the obvious one. Andrew Durante! second would be Simon Colosimo. Jade North will prove he's better than Sigmund when he takes his spot in a months time. If North isn't performing as good for us as Durante then I wonder how they could justify picking him over the latter.

A-league-phobic.aitkenmike2010-08-25 15:58:32

Based on A-League form Beauchamp wouldn't make the White Ferns, forget about the All Whites.  I don't think North would make our starting line-up but would be at least on par with Siggy on the bench, if not further in line.

All in all I don't think NZ are that far behind Australia.  Australia really need some younger players to really come through and carry the baton when the likes of Schwarzer, Cahill, Kewell, Culina (LOL), and Neill retire.  I don't really know who'll do that.  Admittedly I've seen less Australia games than many on here, probably, but that's just what I think from the games I've seen them play over the past half decade.

Incidentally, wouldn't it be fantastic if NZ got the huge levels of immigration that Australia has had from Italy, Serbia, Greece, Croatia etc.  A fair chunk of their talent comes from players born overseas or whose parents/grandparents were born abroad.  Talent like that would hugely add to the All Whites.  Not saying we don't have any, but if we had it on the level of Australia we'd have the talent to support several A-League teams (FFA permitting) and have players plying their trade in decent leagues in Europe who still would struggle to make the All Whites.

"Huge" levels of European migratation to Australia is now more dribs and drabs as such. What are you trying to say here?

You may be right with some of your picks, but you started this off with apart from Cahill and a 100 year old keeper, the rest were crap.
I am obviously not the only one to disagree. Burns for example was here last month with AEK and he impressed Rangers so much that they were keen to sign him. He is a good player. In my opinion if there were an 18 man squad picked from both countries we would be lucly to het 4, and in the starting line up, 1 for sure.

i thought smeltz would start as well as nelson

Jesus - the Sigmund love on here is so f**king ridiculous

Your are so right.

Ah, didn't know when most of it happened but you look at the names of a whole heap of the players in the A-League who are Aussies, so many of them are of South/South-Eastern European descent.  From what knowledge I have of those areas those who play sport play football more than rugby, cricket and league (with some exceptions, of course).  It seems in NZ we get/have had a fair number of British immigrants and a whole heap of them are as likely to play rugby as they are football.  Aussie gets British migrants also, for obvious reasons, but with all the immigrants from other places who play football, combined with a far larger population, they produce a good number of promising footballers.  So I thought that there'd be a fair chance of us producing more footballers if more people from those parts of the world emigrated (or had emigrated) here.

Basically there are some whopping generalizations there but I'm sure you get what I mean whether you agree or not.

Of course, both countries have a fair bit of Asian immigration (where football is big) and I don't know if we've ever had an Asian All White or if there's been an Asian Socceroo.
loyalgunner2010-08-25 22:58:00