Australia’s players admitted to making critical individual mistakes, overthinking and going into their shell in a brutal post mortem of the humbling loss to France.
The Socceroos gave themselves a golden shot of joining Saudi Arabia in pulling off a famous World Cup upset after taking a shock early lead at Al Janoub Stadium.
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But France quickly asserted their authority with stars Kylian Mbappe, Oliver Giroud, Antoine Griezmann and Adrien Rabiot tearing Graham Arnold’s young squad to shreds in a result that leaves Australia needing something special to reach the last 16.
Young centre back Kye Rowles gave a terrifying account of what it was like trying to defend against some of the world’s best attacking players
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“They go slow, slow, lull you into a false sense of security then they just hit you, pretty fast. When they cross it it’s just the perfect ball,” he said “That’s what quality players do.”
Several costly errors in defence hurt Australia big-time and while players didn’t mince words about their shortcoming against the reigning world champions, they remain optimistic about their tournament hopes.
“Obviously individual mistakes at this level are just so ruthlessly punished,” Jackson Irvine said.
“Players of such intense quality and ruthlessness at this level will just punish you every time . It’s a tough school, a tough lesson for us to learn but it’s the right time to do it with two massive games to go,” midfielder veteran Jackson Irvine said.
“… You can see the disappointment in everyone’s faces now and I think that shows the mentality of the group, that you can be so disappointed after coming up against the defending world champions and thinking we maybe could have done a bit better.
“Tonight is a disappointing result for us but we’ve got two massive games coming up and we’ll react, we’ll recover and we’ll give it absolutely everything to try and get a result and give ourselves a chance of progressing.”
Here’s a look at what every Socceroos player who spoke post-match said about the performance:
HARRY SOUTTAR
“Two preventable goals from our point of view was disappointing. Avoidable goals, we need to do better. Three goals, crosses, we pride ourselves on being better at. It’s disappointing but we’ve got a massive game ahead (against Tunisia).
“World class players can turn it on in a split second. We didn’t do enough and we can defend a lot better.
“…We just stopped playing, maybe they pressed a little bit higher. But that’s where we’ve got to be a little bit smarter. Just the way the game evolved, you’ve got to change something.”
AARON MOOY
“We started the game well and sort of went into our shell a little bit … I felt like we were thinking too much.
“They’re a good team and they’re world champions for a reason … they find a way to get the end product, they’re smart players. You can see it watching. They wait for the right moments and then they punish it.”
AZIZ BEHICH
“We let them put their foot on the ball and get the rhythm of the game. The second goal wasn’t ideal, just before halftime. I thought we played well when we had the ball, playing out from the back really well they couldn’t press us the way they wanted.
“Little errors against world class opponents, you get punished. We’ll learn from that, put this behind us, full steam ahead against Tunisia.”
KYE ROWLES
“We started well, but could only hold out so long.
“They (France’s stars) go slow, slow, lull you into a false sense of security then they just hit you, pretty fast. When they cross it it’s just the perfect ball. That’s what quality players do.
“It was sloppy from myself picking up in the box, you can’t afford to give them space. They had three headers in the box. Got to work on that. If we nullify those opportunities for any team, we’ll be tough to beat.
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MITCH DUKE
“It started (well), but it faded away from the goal unfortunately.
“Those two centre backs were absolute beasts. Off the ball they were quite physical as well. But I like playing that way, I can handle it. Just unfortunate we couldn’t play to my strengths a bit more, get a few crosses in, but we have to refocus now.
“The first 20 minutes we couldn’t ask for a better start. Their quality just took over.
“They were cheap goals, in a way. Couldn’t afford those against world class opponents. Chasing those against France, very hard to get back into “
GARANG KUOL
“To see six-foot-four people as quick as me. Just shows the big difference between me and some of those players … only hard work is going to mean making it to that level.
“Generally speaking, it was a good taste to see what the level is at. Some play in the Premier League, some play in the Champions League. It was good to get that taste.
CRAIG GOODWIN
On a personal note, an amazing moment for me, to share that with the boys and my family in the stands. But in the end,a little bit of disappointment, we lose the game but we take the positives out and we go to the Tunisia game in a few days time. We have to go in with full confidence, the group is wide open and we have the belief in this group we can do something special.”
JASON CUMMINGS
“It’s a proud moment, a surreal moment to play in the world cup against France obviously I’m delighted to do that. It’s amazing but it would’ve been a lot more enjoyable if we won the game, that’s the downside, but that’s football.”
“They’ve just go quality players, top top players and they scored a lot of good goals and they punished us.”
JACKSON IRVINE
“We looked really good (in the first 30 minutes) and it’s a period of the game we can look back on and try and grow from, we did a lot of things really well … it was disappointing for it get away from us in the manner it did.”
GRAHAM ARNOLD
“At the end of the day the quality of the French team… they are the previous world champions for a reason. I thought we started the game very well, physically they were just so much bigger, faster and stronger than us today.
Overall, the boys did everything they could and that’s all I can ask”
OLIVIER GIROUD (FRANCE)
“We shouldn’t have been surprised by this start, we were aware about the determination of Australian players. They played well at the beginning but most importantly we just reacted straight away.
“It was massively important for us to win this first game “
