Australia limped into the last eight of the Asian Cup following a penalty shoot out win over Uzbekistan.
After 120 goal-less minutes Graham Arnold’s side went through 4-2 on penalties against the side rated 95th in the FIFA rankings.
It was another grim day at the office for the Socceroos who lost to Jordan in the group phase before beating Palestine 3-0 then requiring a last gasp winner from Tom Rogic to get the better of Syria.
How about, the next game…..SCORE A GOAL IN REGULAR TIME
— Robert (@Robert9YNWA) January 21, 2019
This is the most Boring football I have ever watched and I sat through Sam allardyce managing my team Everton last season. WAKE UP
— kai (@gotheroos29) January 21, 2019
How can’t we beat Uzbekistan? @FFA you lot have shown zero improvement in 10 years, develop some young talent ffs.
— Matt (@matt_the_irish) January 21, 2019
I’m 35 years old and I genuinely don’t remember seeing an Australian side (I can’t bear to call them “Socceroos”) this bad. For reals. We suck so hard it hurts my eyes. pic.twitter.com/E9bEOEKbnE
— Michael Amloh (@amloh_mick) January 21, 2019
Rogic played for 111 minutes of today’s stalemate which drew stinging criticism from Aussie fans on their twitter feed.
Australia will now face either host nation UAE or South Korea on Friday with the match against South Korea tipped to be the final before the tournament kicked off.
Arnold is likely to come in for heavy criticism for today’s performance with his decision to call in his European based players ten days ahead of a meaningless friendly against Oman in which Hibs winger Martin Boyle suffered an injury likely to put him out of action until the end of the season.