Postecoglou insists that just qualifying for the World Cup is not enough and the Socceroos boss wants his side to make a bigger impact on world football.

Australia begin their third phase of World Cup qualification in Perth on Thursday night (8.30pm AEST) when they face Iraq at nib Stadium.

Postecoglou said he had a “fair idea” of the team he would field and believed the scrutiny his side had shown towards their opponents would be beneficial.

“I literally have four or five starting XIs I could put out tomorrow and I’d feel confident about all of them in getting the job done,” he said.

“I’ll have a look at how the boys go, today’s our first session where everyone’s in and we’ll see after that.

“We study everyone, that’s why we’re a strong team. We respect every opposition, every opposition gets equal respect. Nothing changes and the reason we are where we are is because we’re a strong team.

“We’ll continue to get stronger is because we always pay respect to the opposition. Sometimes the opposition doesn’t pay respect to us, it works in our favour.”

Postecoglou hoped their 2015 Asian Cup success, as well as topping the group table in the second stage of qualification, would increase expectations of supporters.

“Football fans in Australia are just as knowledgeable as any other fans. I think they know exactly how difficult it’s going to be, I don’t think anyone’s taking it for granted,” Postecoglou said.

“It’s not like we’ve coasted through them, particularly the last one, We had to fight tooth and nail to get there, it’s not that long ago we didn’t get there.

“I think the Australian football public is as well-educated and intelligent as anyone else and they understand how difficult it’ll be and they understand for us, we’re going to have to overcome some challenges.

“I hope the expectations of the Australian football public have changed, it’s not just about qualifying any more, it’s about something greater than that. Hopefully that’s what gets people to come out and see us, hopefully we’re building something special.”

Postecoglou also acknowledged the difficulties in playing away games in the qualifiers, saying it was imperative to get a result at every home game.

“After the Asian Cup 18 months ago, we had this as the starting point and everything we’ve done in between is to make sure when got to this point we were comfortable of where we’re at,” Postecoglou said.

“I’m comfortable with the group of players we have here, who understand their roles and responsibilities within our style of game and the belief in what we do. I’m comfortable of where we’re at.”