- Whether you call it football or soccer, the World Cup is still full of excitement...
For countries in the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), World Cup qualification can be a long, arduous process. For no team is this truer than Australia, who have had to pass through four separate rounds of qualifiers before ensuring their participation in Qatar this November.
Australia got a bye for the first round, as all highly ranked AFC nations do, before finding themselves drawn in group B in the second round. A five-team group, they were drawn with Kuwait, Jordan, Nepal, and Chinese Taipei, with only one team able to qualify for the next round. Australia secured that spot at the top of the group, picking up 24 points as they won all eight matches in the round.
Kuwait and Jordan both managed 14 points, but they were never really a threat to Australia’s chances of winning the group and reaching the third round. For those who bet on football, Australia were a sure thing to qualify from their group. However, the next round was a different story.
The third round of AFC qualifying is fiercely competitive, with the 12 teams that made it out of the second round competing for just four spots. Australia were drawn into group B, along with Saudi Arabia, Japan, Oman, China, and Vietnam. Saudi Arabia topped the group on 23 points, while Japan took the second qualifying spot with 22 points.
There was still hope left, the team that finished third would still be able to qualify through a play-off process. While Australia were favorites for this spot, they were run close by Oman, who were strong at home and managed a surprise 1-0 win in Japan. However, Australia edged them out by a single point, finishing with 15 points to Oman’s 14 to qualify for the fourth round of qualifying.
Australia headed into a single match play-off with United Arab Emirates, who finished third in group A. The game was played at a neutral venue, in Qatar. Australia took the lead through Jackson Irvine eight minutes into the second half, before UAE hit back through Caio a few minutes later. The score remained level until late on, when Ajdin Hrustic scored the winner with 84 minutes on the clock.
Australia held on for the final few minutes, to record a 2-1 win in the fourth round of qualifying. However, one final obstacle stood before them. Having not managed to qualify first time round, they were pitted against the South American side which suffered the same fate, in an intercontinental play-off.
They would play Peru, who finished fifth in CONMEBOL’s qualifying tournament, ahead of Colombia and Chile, amongst others. The sides had met previously, at the 2018 World Cup. Both teams were in group C of the competition when Peru, who had already been eliminated, won the match 2-0. Graham Arnold’s Australia would be hoping for a better result this time round.
The format for this was again a single play-off match, held in Qatar. It was a tense affair, with no goals scored during the game. Even after 30 minutes of extra time, the neither side had managed to take an advantage. The game was heading to a penalty shootout when Graham Arnold made a substitution. Normal goalkeeper, and captain, Mat Ryan was brought off for Andrew Redmayne.
It reminded many of Louis van Gaal’s decision to bring on Tim Krul for Jasper Cillessen during the 2014 World Cup, with Krul saving two Costa Rican penalties on that occasion. Arnold’s decision here produced a similar result. Redmayne appeared to dance on the goal line in an attempt to put off the Peruvian penalty takers, and it worked.
Although Australia’s first penalty wasn’t converted, they went on to win the shootout 5-4, after six penalties apiece. Redmayne made the crucial save, palming away Alex Valera’s penalty to secure a place in the World Cup group stages for Australia. After a long and convoluted qualifying process, Arnold and his side deserve credit for finding a way to keep going, and their efforts were more than rewarded in the end. When they line up against France, Denmark, and Tunisia in November, there’s no doubt that remembering how hard they worked for the opportunity will only motivate them more.