The Football Tragic

The Socceroo squad for the Asian Cup qualifier against Indonesia has been announced, and it looks a fairly good one on balance.

Pim Verbeek's decision to favour club partnerships in attack makes sense. Certainly Archie Thompson and Danny Allsopp showed all their old understanding in the latter stages of Friday's game again the Mariners, who have also provided the group with a striking pairing. Although Dylan McAllister has gone off the boil a little, Matt Simon's selection is expected and pleasing.

Simon has surprised many. When he first turned out for the Mariners, he looked physically imposing but technically very poor, often squandering opportunities in front of goal with wretched first touches. But he has clearly worked on this aspect of his game, and has matured into one of the most dangerous strikers in the domestic game. His physical, aggressive style has already brought some success against Asian defences, too.

Joel Griffiths was perhaps a bit unlucky to miss out on a striking spot, but he hasn't quite regained peak form since his injury. It is a shame that Nikita Rukavytsya is otherwise engaged in Holland, but the attack should still have enough pace to worry the Indonesians at times.

It's difficult to identify a true leader in midfield (Mile Jedinak would surely have been the first name on the list but for his move to Turkey), but with Paul Reid, Matt McKay and Matt Thompson in the mix, there is enough grit and nous in the engine-room. Travis Dodd must consider himself very unfortunate to miss out, however, especially given that the squad is otherwise short of players who can operate effectively on the right. Shannon Cole is a strange choice at first glance, but perhaps Verbeek has been impressed by his dead-ball prowess; he might offer an alternative to Reid in that department, in positions that would favour a delivery with the left foot.

Sasa Ognenovski's decision to throw in his lot with Macedonia is disappointing, but a centre-half pairing of Craig Moore and Roddy Vargas looks solid enough. The selection of Robbie Cornthwaite and Nikolai Topor-Stanley as understudies is bizarre, though; both are capable in the air but very ordinary otherwise (Cornthwaite hasn't earned his nickname of "The Shin" for nothing). More worthy candidates, in my view, would have been Andrew Durante (who has, admittedly, suffered from hamstring trouble lately), or even Luke DeVere.

Looking further ahead, it's interesting that Verbeek has singled out Scott Jamieson for praise ahead of the game. For all the A-League's achievements, none of the players "nursed" in the new domestic league has looked a certain future Socceroo regular, but with Scott Chipperfield on the wane and David Carney still not quite adequate defensively, Jamieson could indeed play an important role in the future, in what has been a problem position for the Socceroos whenever Chipperfield has been away.