Australia’s journey to Tokyo 2020 is back on track after a come-from-behind 2-1 win over host nation Thailand at the AFC U23 Championships.
Going down a goal early on, a brace from Nicholas D’Agostino salvaged the contest for coach Graham Arnold’s side, who ran over the top of their opponents after a first half in which they were thoroughly outplayed.
“I think we showed great character as a team after going down 1-0,” Arnold said. “It (conceding) took the confidence out of the team for a good ten minutes or so, but I thought after that, especially second half, we played very well and should have won by more.”
The junior War Elephants had taken the lead in the 24th minute when, after seizing control of the game in the preceding ten minutes, a driven sequence of pass and move football down the left flank resulted in a Thitathorn Aksornsri shot that careened off the post and back into play.
Attacker Anon Amornlerdsak was then waiting to fire it back in on target - beating Australian keeper Tom Glover to give his side the lead.
A careless turnover by Tass Mourdoukoutas almost gifted the Thais a second in the 30th minute after his attempt at a dainty loft out from the back was intercepted by Supachai Jaided.
Spotting Glover off his line, the attacker attempted a lofted effort from close to the halfway line that, although it went over the bar, was far to close to finding the net for comfort for the Australians.
Mourdoukoutas error wasn’t an isolated event as Australia continued to be caught in possession as they looked to build out from the back in the aftermath of the goal
Football, though, is a cruel game, and for all their dominance the Thais found themselves going into the rooms level at halftime when, two minutes before the break, Reno Piscopo won the ball in the midfield and darted forward before picking out a run of D'Agostino.
Dashing onto the ball played through the Thai lines by his teammate, D’Agostino sharply dragged the ball back across his body to beat goalkeeper Korraphat Nareechan at the far post and level proceedings.
Sucker punched just before the break, the Thais were clearly tiring in the second half and the tide began to turn.
Played through after a clever decision to let the ball run by substitute Al Hassan Toure, Reno Piscopo had a chance to take the lead in the 74th minute when he advanced in on the left but, instead of launching a left-footed effort in on goal, his attempt to cut back onto his right enabled the defence to get back and deny him.
The Wellington Phoenix attacker, though, made amends just two minutes later when he deftly scooped a ball over two Thai defenders for Alex Gersbach to run onto and cut back to the top of the six-yard-box for D’Agostino.
Placed in a position where it would have been harder to miss than score, the Perth Glory attacker made no mistake as he fired his side ahead.
He then should have had a third in the 79th minute when he was found in open space in the penalty area by Piscopo, but his attempted shot hit nothing but air and allowed the ball to scoot through, bounce off his torso and collect his hand.
Further (butchered) chances followed for Arnold’s side, but they were not punished for their late profligacy in front of goal – eventually running out 2-1 winners.
“Obviously it was a tough game in front of the 22,000 fans that came out tonight,” D’Agostino said post-game.
“Thailand in their home country, it was always going to be a big game but especially going 1-0 down early, that was tough, but we knew that we had the fight and courage to come back and we showed a lot of that tonight and got the result and that is massive for us.”
“My job is to score goals and that is what I am here to do and that is what Graham [Arnold] has belief in me to do and it is a great feeling scoring for your country, there is no better feeling in the world.”
A game of two halves.
Saying Thailand controlled the first half isn’t doing their performance justice.
The host nation dominated proceedings across the first 45, threatening to overrun the Australians as they seemingly won every 50/50 contest, chased down every loose ball and launched attack after attack after attack.
The ‘super’ triumvirate of Mueanta, Jaided and Supachok Sarachat, aided by some smart play from left-back Aksornsri, swarmed the Australian back four in both attack and defence – applying the type of fierce forward pressure that, had it not been happening to his team, would have brought a smile to the face of Arnold.
Yet, lucky to not be down by a goal or three at the half, the Australian gaffer’s introduction of the steady hand of Genreau, perhaps combined with breaking out the hairdryer during the halftime talk, augured a change in fortunes for the side in green and gold.
While not immediately swinging the pendulum totally back around until roughly the hour mark, the Olyroos performance clearly improved as they lifted their intensity to match and eventually better the pace and power of their opponents.
The substitutions of Suphanat Mueanta and Jaided also aided in the turnaround, as the junior War Elephants lost two of their most potent attacking weapons to the bench.
Running out of both ideas and juice, the hosts – playing in front of 20,000+ home fans – failed to match the Australians in the game’s dying stages – lucky that Australia was rather blunt when presented with chances to add to their lead.
Nonetheless, a strong finish that owed just as much to Thailand's follies as their own play shouldn’t paper over the cracks of what was a concerning first half for the Australians.
Outhustled and outplayed by their opponents, the Olyroos found themselves struggling to get anything going when they were unable to bring their physical capabilities to bear and, predominantly, were only able to get back into the game when the Thais began to fade away.
Given their second-half fadeout, perhaps the Thais simply poured everything into the first half in the hopes of taking a lead into the second that they could sit back and defend.
Perhaps the Australian XI - featuring six new faces after the Iraq game - needed time to gel. Maybe it was a lack of time spent under Arnold that led to misunderstandings about player roles that were subsequently fixed at halftime.
Whatever the causes were, ahead of what should nominally be the most straightforward of their three group games against Bahrain, Australian fans will be hoping that their side will be able to be more convincing in the wee hours of Wednesday morning.
The value of minutes
It perhaps shouldn’t have come as a surprise that Australia was unable to cower their opponents in the opening half – the Thai attack not populated by players likely to wilt in the face of pressure.
Striker Jaided is a 17-time senior Thai international and has made 100 appearances across the Thai and Asian Champion’s League. Another senior international, Supachok Sarachat has made 101 appearances in the same competitions and goal scorer Amornlerdsak has 88 league appearances and five in the Champions League.
Mueanta, while the least experienced of the quartet, is still the reigning ASEAN young player of the year, a senior Thai international and has made 21 league and five Champions League appearances before his 18th birthday.
He made history when he made appeared in the Thai league at just 15 years of age – setting the record as the competition’s youngest debutant.
That the four are simply better than the Australian players is a matter for debate - the likes of Piscopo, Genreau, Gersbach and Jacob Italiano all arguably have more natural talent and varying European pedigrees - but they all play regularly, they often play together and they cardinally play more often than the lion's share of Australian youth.
Indeed, the challenges faced by Australian youngsters in their attempts to gain regular playing time are well-documented, and Sunday morning’s first half demonstrated just what young players empowered by regular and meaningful playing time can do.
Of course, simply calling for young Aussie players to receive more minutes is an easy to make an ultimately meaningless platitude – solutions need to be found.
With the country’s youth league – the Y-League – only eight games long and frequently bereft its prospects that are called up to fill out the benches of A-League clubs, Arnold has repeatedly called for the introduction of a reserve league in Australia to get more minutes into young legs.
Those calling for a national second division have pointed to the opportunities it will provide young players as one of its key selling points.
Short term player contracts and a lack of transfer fees between A-League clubs also removes one of the greatest incentives – profit – to play young players at the top level and there remains a prevailing ‘wisdom’ in the Australian game that, everything else being equal, still favours veterans over youngsters.
Of course, as Arnold likes to say, youngsters have to earn the right to see the pitch.
However, much more can be done to remove barriers to them playing when they have done so.
Australia all but certain to progress
While there remain a few, unlikely, scenarios in which it doesn’t happen, the three points earned against the Thais are likely to be enough to ensure that Australia will progress to the quarterfinals of the Championships and keep their dreams of Olympic qualification alive.
Top of their group with four points, a single point earned against bottom of the group Bahrain will be enough to guarantee progression, whereas a win would ensure that the Olyroos do so as the winners of Group A.
Thailand and Iraq will meet in the group’s other fixture, with whichever side that prevails in that contest guaranteed progression. Should the Thais triumph and Australia fail to take maximum points, they will go through as group winners.
The winners of Group A will take on the runners-up in Group B in the quarterfinals, while the second-placed finishers will face Group B’s winners.
Saudi Arabia – featuring a number of players that knocked Australia out of the most recent AFC U19 Championship – currently top that group after one matchday, with Syria and Qatar level on points and Japan bringing up the rear.
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