Bend in the Weather

Last night 82,698 people crammed into a capacity filled Telstra Stadium to see the Socceroos (Australia's national football team) make it into the World Cup.



What most people didn't know was they were about to witness one of the most thrilling games of football the country has ever seen.


Australia needed to score 2:0 to win the decider after going down on Sunday 1:0.
By half time we were halfway there, with Marco Bresciano slotting one in behind the goal-keeper after a Harry Kewell miskick spilled into his waiting boots.
By full time the score was 1:0 to Australia, meaning extra-time was required. An extra 30 minutes couldn't see the dead-lock broken; though the Australians had most of the attacking play.
The game went down to a penalty shoot-out. This was time for the Australian goal-keeper Mark Schwarzer to step up to the plate.

Schwarzer was clam and collected whilst the entire nation were on the edge of their seats, nail-biting and hoping this was not going to be another crushing defeat, so close again.
Schwarzer won the match for us, with two brilliant saves to restrict the Uruguay to two penalty goals.


When Aloisi had slotted home the 5^th penalty for a 4:2 win, the realisation had come.
Australia had made it the World Cup! An achievement that last occurred 32 years ago!
Now everything turns to Germany in 2006. How far we go in the competition, who knows?

Making the Cup has been a big challenge in itself and after 7 consecutive unsuccessful attempts it's great to finally get there again. I was only 1 last time they played in a world cup.

Whilst they are likely to be 100:1 chance of winning the competition, getting there is half the battle and anything can happen.
It will be fantastic to finally be able to barrack for our own nation in this competition!

I was like thousands of males around Australia this morning that rose at 6:30am to see the Socceroos compete in Uruguay in Montevideo to see if they could qualify for next years FIFA Word Cup to be held in Germany.
The crowd obviously was backing for their home team (Uraguay) with a small band of Aussies (around 300) that headed there to support the Socceroos.


The game was entertaining, and the Australians had much of the possession and strike in the first half, but were unable to capitalise. The South Americans were able to score just prior to half time through a dubious free kick, a well executated set-play and some poor defence from the Australian defenders.
The 2^nd half saw Uruguay with their tails up, keeping our defence under pressure. Several close attempts from the Aussies, yet no success.

The game ended in a 1:0 victory to Uraugay. Though the Australian's can hold their heads high, last visit they went down 3:0 (the last time they were knocked out of the World Cup Qualifier, and agaist Uraugay that time too!).

All is not lost. Each team get a home game. So that means both teams will be flying back to compete here in Australia. Wednesday night will see them go head-to-head at Sydney's Telstra Stadium.

SBS will be covering it from 7:00pm on Wednesday night, so either get to the ground if you're in Sydney or watch from home on SBS if you're not.
We've got a very good chance of going through, and the team will need all the support they can get! If they qualify it will be the first time since 1973!

Go Socceroos Go!

Well I watched the NRL Grand Final.

I was going with North Queensland, though I didn't have any problems with the Tigers winning. It's their first premiership as a team (they merged in 2000 from Wests and Balmain who both previously won a premiership in 1952 and 1969 respectively).

It was a great game... attacking football that both teams have trademarked this season.

The final 30-16 scoreline, didn't really show how well the Cowboys played... and the Tigers were lucky that they were able to benefit from some mistakes from the Cowboys.

Well that's football over for another year... thank goodness Paramatta and the Broncos didn't feature in this years Final!