My starting XI for the crunch game against Thailand

Its been a few days since the Socceroos disastrous performance against Iraq and the dust is slowly drifting back to earth but no where near settling. It took me a while to calm down and I consoled myself by reading through the 2006/07 Melbourne Victory Yearbook, that recently arrived in my mailbox. Now its time to look towards the match against Thailand. It is my understanding that if Australia beats Thailand we should be able to make it through to the next round of the competition. So with this in mind it is time for me to express my opinion on who I think should be playing in this all important match - probably one of the most important of recent times.

With the enforced change of losing Neill for receiving a second yellow card late in the match against Iraq, Kisnorbo probably gets his final chance in the centre of defense. I have brought both Milligan and Beauchamp into the team to provide us with a solid but mobile back four and moving Emerton onto the wing and moving Holman back to the bench. Emerton's attacking efforts have been good, but his defense has left us in a spot of bother, so to relieve of some of those duties may benefit the team. Otherwise the team remains the same. Today I again saw the footage of the goal that Australia did score against Iraq, with a great set of passes and touches (15 in all) and all of them along the ground except for the final cross. For us to beat Thailand we need to play in this style. I am looking forward to the game and hope the Australians can put in a good performance and we make it out of the group stage. If this happens who know what will happen.

Go Socceroos!