Target Tokyo: Graham Arnold unveils 23-player Olyroos squad for Asian Championships

After an extended preparation campaign that featured multiple friendlies and training camps, Arnold has named 14 players from A-League clubs in his squad alongside nine European-based players.

With Tom Glover, Denis Genreau, Connor Metcalfe and Ramy Najjarine all selected, Melbourne City lead all A-League clubs with four representatives.

Sydney FC (Trent Buhagiar and Tom Heward-Belle), Western Sydney Wanderers (Keanu Baccus and Tass Mourdoukoutas) and Brisbane Roar (Aiden O’Neill and Connor O’Toole) joining City in sending multiple representatives to Arnold's squad.

Melbourne Victory (Thomas Deng), Perth Glory (Nicholas D'Agostino), Wellington Phoenix (Reno Piscopo) and Adelaide United (Al Hassan Toure) will all send lone representatives.

Former Glory prodigy and now Borussia Monchengladbach attacker Jacob Italiano highlights the foreign contingent set to link up with the squad, with AGF Aarhus’s Zach Duncan, SC Cambuur’s Daniel Bouman and Ipswich Town’s Ben Folami also selected.

Glaswegian-born Fortuna Dusseldorf defensive midfielder Joshua Laws will set his sights on becoming the nest Scottish-Australian breakout star with his selection.

“I am happy with the final make-up of our squad for next month’s Championship,” Arnold said on the squad’s release. “Over the past twelve months, we have considered many players both at home and abroad as we’ve looked to grow the pool of players available to us.

“To finalise the 23 players for this tournament was no simple task – we had over 50 players on our radar for this tournament, so we will arrive in Thailand with a strong squad and one that I believe will represent Australia well.”

“Between arriving in camp in Kuala Lumpur and our first game of the tournament against Iraq in Bangkok we have only nine days. As a group, it’s important that we are disciplined and focused from the outset as we seek to make the most of our time together.

“Our target in Thailand is to become the U23 champions of Asia, and we know if we can achieve that further opportunities will come the team’s way in 2020.

“Supporters in Australia will be familiar with many of the A-League-based players in the squad, but I am excited for the football community to learn more about some of the overseas-based boys throughout January, too.

“There are some fantastic young players in our squad with the potential to progress to the Socceroos in the coming years.” 

Running from January 8 to 26 - meaning players may be missing from A-League clubs up to round 17 of the season - 16 nations have qualified for the Thailand-hosted tournament. 

The Olyroos are set to play South Korea in a final warm-up friendly on January 3, before formally commencing their campaign on the tournament’s opening night in a clash with Iraq at the Thammasat Stadium in Rangsit. 

That will be followed by meetings with the host nation on January 11 in Bangkok and a rising Bahrain side back in Rangsit on January 14. 

Should they do enough to finish as one of the top two finishers in Group A and earn progression to the knockout stages, Australia would then meet one of two qualifiers from a strong Group B featuring Qatar, Japan, Saudi Arabia and Syria in the quarterfinals.

With Japan having already punched their tickets to the Olympics by virtue of their host status, only the top three finishers in Thailand are guaranteed a place at Tokyo 2020. That requirement will be stretched to four, though, if the Blue Samurai is one of the championship’s semi-finalists. 

Unfortunately for Arnold’s side, the weight of history may be against them.

Despite qualifying for all three previous staging’s of the AFC’s U23 Championships, Australia has yet to progress to the final four – their best result coming in Oman in 2013 when they reached the quarterfinals.

In the two most recent iterations of the competition in 2016 and 2018, the Olyroos failed to progress beyond the group stages.

Coincidentally, Australia’s last qualification came under current-gaffer Arnold back in 2008, when he was an assistant coach to then-Socceroos boss Pim Verbeek.

Opening their run with a 1-1 draw with Serbia in Beijing, the Olyroos would lose 1-0 to Argentina thanks to an Ezequiel Lavezzi goal in their second game and 1-0 to a strike from Ivory Coast’s Salomon Kalou in their final game to exit in the group stages.

Australia U-23 Men’s National Team Squad | AFC U-23 Championship Thailand 2020