The Socceroos bagged a historic 1-0 win against Denmark overnight to secure their place in the World Cup Round of 16 for just the second time.
It was scenes reminiscent of the 2006 ‘Golden Generation’ that saw the likes of Tim Cahill, Harry Kewell, and Mark Schwarzer progress in Germany.
The Danes dominated the opening stages of the first half, and with Tunisia taking a surprise lead over world champions France, Australia needed something special.
Queue Matthew Leckie, and a beautiful solo goal in the 60th minute.
The Socceroos held on to secure a date with Lionel Messi’s Argentina in the Round of 16.
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It will be the Socceroos' first appearance in the World Cup knockout stages since the so-called ‘Golden Generation’ turned Australia into a football-loving country.
Australia boss Graham Arnold believes his men are on the verge of being talked about as the next ‘golden generation’.
After the match, he said: “It’s the first time ever an Australian team’s won two games at a World Cup, in a row, maybe we’re talking about a new golden generation.
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“Because I’ve been listening and hearing about that golden generation of 2006, they got four points, and now we’ve got six, so maybe we’re talking about a new generation.”
Arnie has outlined his intention of uniting the country as a football nation once again, and with scenes like in Melbourne’s federation square, he’s most certainly done that.
He added: “I’m just so proud and happy, it’s what World Cups are for, I truly believe that the Socceroos are the team that unites the nation. you don’t see when the cricket world cup’s on, the final.
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“Federation square like it is, pubs like they are, if it’s rugby union, rugby league or anything, but the World Cup of football unites the nation, and I’m just so proud we’ve been able to put smiles on people’s faces.”
The 2006 team ultimately fell to Italy in a heartbreaking tie, but the current crop of players are already thinking about healing that heartache from 16 years ago.
Captain, Matthew Ryan said: “It’s also great to see that we’re an ambitious group because everyone’s enjoying the victory and all that post match there out on the pitch. But the comment’s already coming out, yeah, we’re not done yet.
“We wanna keep going, we wanna keep going. So we wanna make this chapter as special as it can be. And the only way we can continue doing that is obviously by keep having victories like we did tonight.
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“And we wanna go as deep as we can and we wanna continue to make the nation as proud, as proud as we possibly can.”
The Socceroos go up against Argentina at 6 am AEDT on Sunday morning (December 4).
The entire nation will be watching.
Topics: Australia, Football, Football World Cup, Qatar
Jayden Collins