The Straya "Hopping into History" thread

I'll leave this here ...

I think few Aussies would argue that centre-back Spiranovic is in the same class as Reid though - Spiranovic failed to make it in Germany and Japan (four seasons with Nurnberg in the German First and Second divs - only 24 appearances) and was dropped by his J-League side Urawa Reds in his second season and not used at all, leading to a transfer request to Al Arabi in Qatar where he lasted one season before ending up back in the A-League at Western Sydney:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_%C5%A0piranov...

He's a decent enough A-League defender but has never performed consistently at the same level as Reid. Very injury prone too.

At 26 he's already prematurely ended his European career and followed the path players usually take late in their careers such as Wynton Rufer did of playing in Japan and Qatar, before returning home.

Again, Alex Wilkinson was a decent enough A-League centre-back at Central Coast (now playing in Korea) but was only called in to the Socceroos aged 29 to make his full debut in a friendly in March due to a lack of better options. In his case, you can't say he's even played a the same level as Tommy Smith who plays in the Championship.

I wasn't too impressed by the he Socceroos defence to be honest - the fullbacks were pretty average too. Davidson failed to pick up his man a lot and isn't a patch on his dad who I saw playing for Nottingham Forest and Glasgow Rangers in the 1980's. Ryan McGowan was a decent enough centre-back at Hearts in Scotland and Aussie fans hope he will go to the Championship when his contract in China ends but don't see him as EPL level. He struggled a bit in the World Cup because he was filling in at right-back due to the only right-back in the squad, Franjic,  being injured. He's played fullback for Hearts but the consensus is that he struggles with it at international level.