Australia v Norway

For his first game in charge Bert Van Marwijk chose a surprising first XI. The Norwegians played different football to our usual Asian opponents. Long, direct high balls to a huge centre forward caught out our centre halves and exposed us to dangerous second balls.

The result was poor but the three debutants in Petratos, Nabbout and Sunsjar all played well. Hopefully, the squad can all put this game behind them.

Mat Ryan 4.5

Not a game he’ll remember fondly. Picked the ball out of the back of the net four times and didn’t do much else. He’s taking blame for a bad pass out of defence that caused one of the goals but Jedinak deserves blame there too for not expecting the pass.

Aziz Behich 5.5

The best performing defender in the Australian starting line-up. Most of our successful build up came down his side and his good positioning saw him make several intercepts.

Mark Milligan 3

Struggled against the height and pace of the Norwegian frontmen. He was beaten in the lead up to the Norwegian equaliser. A couple of good passes from defence but also a couple of bad passes.

Milos Degenek 4 

Wasn’t caught out as much as Milligan but he also struggled to deal with the height and pace of the opposition.

Bailey Wright 4

Beaten down the right hand side too often. He was caught a little out of position at right fullback.

Mile Jedinak 5.5

His aerial presence was really important in today’s game. He got his head to a lot of balls. When the play was on the ground the Norwegians were targeting our two holding midfielders. Whilst Mooy dealt with the pressure, Jedinak was rushed into a few wayward passes.

Aaron Mooy 6.5

So many backwards passes in the first half hour but he eventually started to look forward and the team started to play better because of it. His well hit corner created the first goal. He dealt well with some intense pressing from the Norwegians.

Jackson Irvine 6

A great header for Australia’s first goal. The extra weight of the man bun must give him more power. His defending from set pieces was poor. He let his man lose him twice and that was punished by the second Scandinavian goal.

Mathew Leckie 5

Not his best game for the green and gold but probably not his worst either. He didn’t get a chance to use his pace.

Dimitri Petratos 6

Had some good touches and rarely lost the ball up forward. However his passes were mostly backwards so whilst he held it up and kept possession up front he didn’t create anything from his efforts.

Andrew Nabbout 6

Some good hold up play but he was often a very isolated figure. A solid debut. His best moment was when he carried it forward during a fast break from a defensive corner.

SUBS

Aleksandar Susnjar 6

Dealt with the long balls better than Milligan. Looked really composed on debut. Deserves a start on this performance.

Massimo Luongo 5.5

Came onto the pitch with Rogic and the two of them sparked a mini revival in how Australia played.

Tom Rogic 5.5 

Australia were more creative with him on the pitch. He’ll be disappointed he didn’t do more with the space he found.

Tom Juric 5

Didn’t get much of the ball during his time on the pitch.

Robbie Kruse 5 

Looked to get in behind which was a big contrast to Petratos who was always presenting and holding up the play. The Norwegians dealt with it though and he was often too central, leaving his team mates without a wide option.

Nikita Rukavytsya 5

Didn’t get much of the ball.