either Belgium, Iran, Egypt or New Zealand in the Round of 32<\/a>, with kick-off scheduled for Saturday, July 4 at 4am AEST.<\/p>\n\u201cGet up early, please,\u201d Popovic added.<\/p>\n
Speaking on ITV, former Socceroos coach Ange Postecoglou paid tribute to the plucky Australians.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s a great achievement for Australia,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was a tough group and to come second is fantastic for them. It sets them up nicely now.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s another World Cup that they\u2019ve got out of the group stage.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s massive for a country like Australia. We\u2019re at that stage where we\u2019re qualifying for World Cups regularly and now it\u2019s about getting to that next level.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor a lot of countries like Australia and others at that level, for us to break through we\u2019ve got to get to the knockout stages consistently and win knockout games – that\u2019s the next phase.\u201d<\/p>\n
In his post-match press conference, Popovic was asked if played for a draw given it was all Australia needed to advance.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can have opinions on how the game was played or or what we both thought we needed but we at no stage felt that we were playing for a draw. I thought we controlled the game quite well, were in control and had the better opportunities,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we just gave one away at the end from the edge of the box, which was a heart in the mouth moment unfortunately for us. But apart from that we didn\u2019t look like conceding a chance and I thought we looked quite dangerous in around the box. We tried to win the game, in the end a draw is enough for both nations. Congratulations to Paraguay as well.<\/p>\n
\u201cObviously a fantastic manager, great experience, and I\u2019m sure as we are feeling euphoria and joy as a nation, I\u2019m sure Paraguay as well is. So I wish them well going forward.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/amp-img>Tony Popovic, Head Coach of Australia, celebrates after the 0-0 draw during the FIFA World Cup 2026 Group D match between Paraguay and Australia<\/span>Source: Getty Images<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\nWhile Popovic also cast his mind forward to the future and the exciting times ahead of his young squad.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019ve got to be careful how I answer this. I obviously trust them to put them in,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI said in the press conference yesterday that their growth over these two weeks has been outstanding. I believe the growth from the US game was pivotal for us because the second half performance shows that not only are they talented but they are resilient and they are tough and they are ready to play now because they responded very well in the second half.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey created chances against the US, gave nothing away. And when you think of young players without experience, you think that it\u2019s quite easy to fall away and feel sorry for yourself. So they\u2019re showing they\u2019re ready now.<\/p>\n
\u201cWill they get better in the future? I believe naturally they should, once they\u2019re all playing, hopefully in big leagues and playing 50-60 games a year.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn four to eight years, it should be a special group. But I\u2019ve always said why can\u2019t it be a special group now?<\/p>\n
\u201cTheir composure, patience, understanding of what was required today is a credit to them and also the staff for preparing the players so well to have that calmness and belief in themselves to produce a big performance, and we have another chance now. We\u2019ve got eight days to recover, which helps our younger players to get over this euphoria of the win, and then we need to work hard, and we\u2019re a chance.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Socceroos coach Tony Popovic has begged Australians to \u201cget up early\u201d for next week\u2019s Round of 32 clash after the men in green and goal qualified for the knockouts of the FIFA World Cup. Australia secured second place on the Group D standings with a 0-0 draw against Paraguay in Santa Clara on Friday afternoon […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":250118,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[6807],"tags":[156],"class_list":{"0":"post-250117","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-leagues-cups","8":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=250117"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/250117\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/250118"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=250117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=250117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sports.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=250117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}