The former Socceroos captain recently retired from playing professional football after a stellar 18 year career that began as a junior in western Sydney and saw him capped 37 times for his country.

Okon, who also represented Australia at the 1992 Barcelona Olympic Games, was recently awarded a Football Federation Australia (FFA) Elite Coach Development Scholarship which enabled him to travel to Europe last year to study the coaching techniques of the “Coverciano” (the Italian Olympic Football Team) and PSV Eindhoven in the Netherlands.

Currently coaching the APIA Leichhardt Tigers in the NSW Premier League, Okon will join new Hyundai A-League club Gold Coast United later this year as assistant coach.

Okon said today that he was looking forward to the upcoming tournament.

“Although the squad has had a limited preparation, I’m very happy with the performance of the players at our training camp in Sydney last week.

“We worked hard on our structure and shape, our mentality going into the competition is good and most importantly we are injury free.

“To win the tournament would be great, but for the players, the opportunity to play international level football against opposition of the quality of Chile, China and the USA will be very beneficial.

“For some of these players, this may be the highest level that they ever compete at internationally, but for others it will be a chance to continue their international football careers and one day hopefully play at an Olympic Games or World Cup for Australia.”

The majority of Okon’s squad compete regularly in FFA's National Youth League competition, with the remainder of the players selected from the Australian Institute of Sport and State Sports Institutes.

With future National Team selection and possible Hyundai A-League contracts up for grabs, as well tough international opposition, the action at the Australian Youth Olympic Festival is sure to be exciting.


Australian National Youth Olympic Team squad

Dylan De Montis (AIS), Steve Lustica (Sydney FC), Dejan Aleksic (Perth Glory), Lucas Andreucci (Adelaide United), Daniel Bowles (Queensland Roar), Tyler Thurtell (Queensland Roar), Josh McVey (Queensland Roar), Kliment Taseski (VIS), Koh Satake (QAS), Petar Franjic (VIS), Jacob Borg (NSWIS), Kearyn Baccus (NSWIS), Mitchell Bevan (Queensland Roar), Joshua Groenewald (VIS), Liam Harvey (Perth Glory), James Virgili (NSWIS), Neko Vujevich (QAS)

Australian Youth Olympic Festival – Football Schedule – Valentine Sports Park, Glenwood

Day 2 – 15 January 2009
Australia v China – kick off 5.00pm AEDT
USA v Chile – kick off 6.00pm AEDT

Day 3 – 16 January 2009
Chile v Australia – kick off 5.00pm AEDT
China v USA – kick off 6.00pm AEDT

Day 5 – 18 January 2009
Chile v China – kick off 5.00pm AEDT
Australia v USA – kick off 6.00pm AEDT