Socceroos seek to build against Venezuela with new and returning options
Jackson Irvine and Riley McGree will be managed by Socceroo staff as they return to international action, while Tony Popovic has enjoyed the presence of "100 miles an hour" James Overy in camp.
HOUSTON, Texas – Wary of their need to continue building their fitness after long injury layoffs, Socceroos coach Tony Popovic will manage the returns of Jackson Irvine and Riley McGree in coming fixtures against Venezuela and Colombia, while Manchester United youngster James Overy has impressed with his “100 miles an hour” aggression in his first senior international camp.
After slipping in late to fill the slot left vacant by Nigeria, who were forced to pull out of the fixtures after sliding into the playoffs of African qualifying, the Socceroos will play for the final time in 2025 across the coming week, starting with Venezuela in Texas on Friday evening, before heading to New York to meet Colombia next Tuesday.
Continuing to cast his net wide as he prepares to zero in on his 26-player squad for next year’s FIFA World Cup, Popovic has named an experimental squad for the games, with the six potential debutants in the squad part of a 15-player contingent with ten caps or fewer. Those figures would be even larger had Deni Jurić not been forced to withdraw from the squad on Wednesday evening, picking up a minor injury in training and flying back to Poland the following morning.
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The Socceroos won’t bring in a replacement player for the injured striker, Popovic and his staff content that the remaining potential centre forwards in their squad – Nick D’Agostino, Mohamed and Al Hassan Touré, and Martin Boyle – are capable of plugging the gap.
“With where we’re situated here, and how much time it would take to bring a player over -- we’ve taken all that into consideration,” said Popovic. “These boys have already been training with us for a few days; they’re in the rhythm, and they’re over the jet lag. So we feel with this group, the 25 players, we’re comfortable with that.”
How much McGree and Irvine can log, however, is unclear. Both have been on the comeback trail from long-term injury – a foot problem preventing Irvine from featuring for the Socceroos since last November, while hamstring issues have sidelined McGree since June – and of the two, only the Middlesbrough midfielder has been able to log a start since returning.
But given that this lone start, logged by McGree when he got through 60 minutes of Boro’s 2-1 win over Birmingham, only came five days ago, some considerations need to centre on potentially going too hard, too soon.
“It’s been good to have them back: their experience, their quality,” Popovic said of Irvine and McGree. “You can see that they’ve missed a lot of minutes, a lot of training time. And it takes a little while to get back to the standards that they expect and where they were before their injuries. But great to have them back, and I’m sure they’ll be able to contribute.”
The Socceroos do have plenty of history with managing players, of course; Jordy Bos has been routinely earmarked to start just one of the two games in a window, albeit he did recently re-aggravate his longstanding hamstring issues while playing with club side Feyenoord.
And a similar kind of approach could be used across the coming week. And that’s only if the duo, who have been as upbeat as one would expect of two Socceroos relishing being back in camp over the past few days, are earmarked to start at all.
“We’ve done that with a lot of players,” Popovic said of the man management. “Jordy is the one we spoke about last time we sat down together. But we’ve been doing that since the start, really, and you have to take that into account.
“We’ve probably exposed Connor Metcalfe a lot more than any other player with a similar situation, but he’s a really robust young man, and he’s been able to handle it really well.
“But everyone’s different. Everyone’s body is different. How they train and how they recover. We’re mindful of not exposing the two of them too much, but also very open-minded to playing them in either of these games.”
Another player whose role in the coming games is uncertain is Manchester United youth product James Overy, who celebrated his 18th birthday in camp and has been named in the squad, despite having yet to log a senior minute in his club career, after his impressive performances at the U20 World Cup in Chile.
Given his relative youth, the step-up in expectations that come with entering one of Popovic’s camps at the international level, and the fact that the coach has made a habit of it to this point, few would be surprised if the Perth-born fullback doesn’t log a minute in the coming games – this window being used as an opportunity to provide him some lessons, encouragement, and insight into the demands of playing at this level.
But after Jacob Italiano bucked the trend of playing in your first camp by starting both the Canada and United States fixtures last month, and that Overy has also exceeded expectations by being picked in the first place, nothing can be written off.
“We’ve just let him be himself,” Popovic said of Overy. “He’s got a smile on his face and [we’re] not putting too much pressure on him, [we want him to] just to play his game. And, obviously, we’re just giving him a few pointers in and around the training sessions.
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“And he’s doing well. He’s settling in good. He’s bringing a lot of enthusiasm to the sessions.
“He’s 100 miles an hour. He’s got a lot of aggression in his play, he’s fast, powerful. It’s nice to see; we’re enjoying having him here.”
Of the game itself, Popovic is prepared for versions of Venezuela, who have presented a variety of different approaches since they entered into something of a reset after failing to qualify for next year’s World Cup – former defender Fernando Aristeguieta has stepped up from the youth ranks to lead La Vinotinto following the sacking of Fernando Batista.
For certain, the coach will want to continue to see his side maintain the aggressive physicality they brought to last month’s games, which served as a response to two New Zealand fixtures in which Popovic felt his side were physically bullied by the Kiwis.
But after emphasising playing more attacking football against the USMNT last month, there’s an on-the-ball focus, too.
“We’ve been working on a few things with the ball,” said Popovic. “Getting better at identifying the moments: identifying if someone is pressing us, that we identify where the space is and how we can penetrate a high line. And if we’re playing against a deeper block, that we’re more patient and we make the right decisions to create those overloads and hurt an opponent differently.
“And then just a little bit more around the front third in terms of our movement into the box, just to try and create more fluency in that area.
“You don’t get a lot of time with the players, so you try and hone in on a couple of areas [and try] to solidify the things that you’ve been doing well, keep the foundation strong. I’m confident we’ll see more things added to our game in these two matches.”