Marco Bresciano
Now just hear me out. I know that for many a fan out there Marco Polo is their favourite Socceroos player. I have watched him toil endlessly and be at the heart of everything good about the Socceroos up until late 2012, when Australia’s road to Brazil seemed improbable. I started to wonder why.
I started to watch some players very closely like ‘The Rattlesnake’ (Lucas Neill) and ‘The Troll’ (Harry Kewell – surely it’s a troll that he wants to play in Brazil?). I noticed that against teams whose goalkeepers wear tracksuit pants because it’s the only clean item of clothing they have after working 65 hours that week as a tailor or chef or something related to NOT SOCCER. We had this bald guy wearing Bresciano’s number, boots and taking up his position, but he wasn’t doing the Bresciano things. He wasn’t covering any ground (critical as the Socceroos never seem to have the ball), he wasn’t distributing well, and he wasn’t putting himself in with a chance to find the net.
It could have been the controversy surrounding his 2012 transfer from Al Nasr to Al Gharafa (true quality playing level) where he claims he bought out the remaining year of his contract to ensure he could leave. Whilst Al Nasr claims that this was incorrect. Either way he was a slug, with slug like feet and we were struggling.
A signature celebration and severe underproduction shouldn’t be defensible because of years of service to quality Italian clubs and the Socceroos for such a good stint. He seems to have checked out of his club career, aged 34 plugging around in Qatar, and he appears to have done the same internationally. Almost every touch is lacking urgency, and if Australia’s current midfield need an injection of anything its energy.
Service noted, and maybe in years to come his important goals, crosses and runs will be remembered with a statue or an appearance on Santo, Sam and Ed’s sports fever. For the right now, Rogic has to take his place. With Holman, and like 5 other guys. The slug is dead. Long live the slug.
Tommy Oar
Over the last 4 years Tommy Oar has scored 5 goals in 90 appearances at club level. He has had 16 assists. Quite simply it hasn’t been the career he was looking for. Reasons why: Not strong enough, not fit enough. Regularly pushed off the ball in one of the less physical leagues in Europe, he finds himself unable to put his mark on games.
As a winger, your job is goals and assists. Crosses in. He fades out of games due to the aforementioned lack of fitness and this could be contributing to the amount of soccer he is actually playing out there. 90 games in 4 seasons goes down to 22.5 games per year, with about 40 on offer. He’s missing almost half of FC Utrecht’s games and the ones he is playing, there’s no statistical production.
For all his pace and tenacity, his lack of physicality makes it tough for him to contribute. 10 games for Australia, no assists, and 1 goal which was scored by result of a cross that was missed by so far that it slipped in off the back post against Japan. Maybe it’s position. Maybe it’s the way this team plays. Maybe he is suffering by being up against Robbie Kruse on the far wing from him, who has gone from strength to strength since his move to Bayer Leverkeusen.
Knowing that Tommy Oar is the best option for the Socceroos wide left going forward, makes me a little worried. Our target has to be scoring headed goals from crosses, and Tommy Oar isn’t sending them in with enough frequency or accuracy. He doesn’t go past players with speed or skill, he doesn’t hold his own with strength. I feel that Tommy may not cut it at international level, but I hope he does. Hopefully he can use the rest of the season to attack the World Cup with some good form and prove me and some of the pundits wrong.
Look Away