Play Through Them! #14 Olyroos Vs Thailand AFC u23 Asian Cup 08/01/2026
You can read this with video embedded here
The Olyroos have made a decent start to their AFC u23 Asian Cup campaign. After taking the lead from an early corner, Thailand threw the game away with a brain fart of a red card tackle from Jensen in just the 12th minute of the match. It is tempting to write off the performance in a game with such an early sending off, but there are lessons we can take as fans from the game, in particular some areas where we’ll want the young lads in the team to improve in the games against China and Iraq.
The two main areas of concern for me can be grouped as inconsistent decision making both with and without the ball (as a United fan I could spend the whole thousand words on Dukuly’s second half, but I won’t subject you to that this time) and vulnerability to counter attacks. Let’s start with decision making without the ball. In the first clip we’ll see Thailand’s play that win’s them the corner which they score from. Watch Paull here, indicated at the pause. He starts fairly deep ready for his direct opponent Sealao (#8) to run at him. When the ball is played wide to Noiwong (#2), Paull steps up very aggressively toward Sealao. But, Sealao has already started making the forward run that Paull was previously covering by sitting a bit deeper. This means that with a little side step Sealao is able to get behind Paull and run onto the straight pass where he then plays the cross which wins the corner. It isn’t necessarily the wrong thing to step up here, if Bovalina and Rawlins had reacted faster they could have been trying to trap Sealao offside. Bovalina (the other CB) does see Paull and reacts to try and step up with him, but Rawlins (the RB) doesn’t step up at all, instead staying with his direct opponent. That Rawlins doesn’t react at all suggest to me that that the plan wasn’t to have an offside trap, and that Paull made the wrong call to step up so aggressively. Of course, I’m not on the inside, and it could have just been a poorly executed offside trap.
video 1 here
I feel bad picking out individuals for criticism, and I do want to emphasise that what we saw in this game was inconsistent decision making, not uniformly poor decision making. In this next clip we see Paull timing his step up very well to get in front of his direct opponent and win the ball. Notice also the difference in what Paull’s opponent is doing, here Phochai (#7) is facing away from goal and failing to protect the ball with his body, whereas in the previous clip Sealao was running toward the goal.
video 2 here
Like this out of possession work, the Olyroos were inconsistent in their decision making with the ball. One obvious place to point this out is Alagich’s decision to shoot straight at the keeper in the 66th minute. But I think more interesting was some of the decision making about when to cross. Some of the crosses were optimistic long balls toward the penalty box, rather then an effort to pick out a particular player or dangerous area. In this clip I’ve put together two instances from the first half where we didn’t make great decisions about when to cross. The first one from Valadon shows a lack of patience. The cross itself is poorly executed, hitting the first defender. But more than this, he does have another player (I think it’s Rawlins, but sorry I’m not sure) ahead of him who has a chance of getting into a much better position for a cross. Even if Valadon beats the first defender, the cross is coming over the attacker’s shoulder and toward the goalkeeper. Especially with a shorter attacker like Jovanovic this sort of cross favours the defenders. We see what this looks like in the second example in this clip, which comes a few minutes later. The cross comes from far too deep, over the attackers and is easily collected by Boonloet in goals.
video 3 here
The last of the concerns I wanted to raise was vulnerability to counter attacks. There were a couple of instances where it was only a lack of quality from Thailand that allowed us to win the ball back, or not concede having given up a chance. In this clip there’s a few things to note. The first, is the lack of pressure from Bovalina on the first Thai player to the clearance. Now we can see at the pause he is changing direction because he’s not close enough to compete, and if he get’s beaten he’s risking letting Simmons get stuck in a 1v3. I think his decision not to compete there is understandable, but I do wonder if Vidmar intended for the players staying back to be so exposed in these circumstances.
When we do create 1v1s to try and break down this counter, we are beaten too easily. At the next pause Simmons has very slightly overrun his position leaving him off balance when Phochai cuts back in toward the centre. Running on from there Bovalina doesn’t react fast enough to Phochai’s underlapping run, letting him in behind to receive the return pass from Baukhai. I’d be interested to know what others think here, because I’m not sure why Bovalina hasn’t closed down Baukhai to make it difficult for him to turn to try and stop this sooner. If nothing else it seems to be asking a lot of Simmons for him to compete twice in a row, when Bovalina is right there to make it difficult.
video 4 here
Lastly here is a boring moment I clipped up, just because I want to use it in coaching. A textbook example from Alagich of dropping to position to get in the way after his line has been broken.
video 5 here
