Graham Arnold discusses squad and facing England and New Zealand

Graham Arnold spoke to Socceroos.com.au in London ahead of the Subway Socceroos' two upcoming international friendlies against England and New Zealand at Wembley and the Gtech Community Stadium respectively.

Read the transcript below of watch the interview in the player above!

Arnold on the mood in camp

It's been fantastic. Obviously, all the staff are in, the players are starting to come in now. But you can tell just by the few players that we've got the excitement's there, but overall it's going to be a fantastic historic occasion. But at the same time, my expectations are improving in our performance and making sure we get things right.

Arnold on Lewis Miller and Massimo Luongo call-ups 

At the end of the day, we've got some injuries as well. Nathaniel Atkinson is injured, Mathew Leckie obviously injured and that gives an opportunity to players who are performing well at club level and club land to show us what they can do. Lewis Miller's playing at Hibs and doing exceptionally well and through all the hard work and everything with Mass Luongo, he thoroughly deserves a call up, he's been excellent at Ipswich. When I first took over, he was an integral part of the setup and the plans ahead, but he had a couple of years of injuries. And you can see he's in a very happy place mentally at the moment at Ipswich and he thoroughly deserves that call up.

Arnold on the overall squad

We are going through a bit more of a rebuild situation at the moment process and when you look at the squad overall, there are 11 players who've had less than 10 caps, there's five or six players that have had between 11 and 20. So it's quite an inexperienced squad. And I did feel with Mexico that when I took off the Mitchell Duke or Jackson Irvine, got injured and we lost that little bit of experience and with the retirement of Aaron Mooy and obviously Tommy Rogic now, we're going through that process of introducing some younger players. It's going to be great to bring in those three train on players in Mohamed Toure, Patrick Yazbek and Alexander Robertson. So all that does is add more depth for the future.

Arnold on players performing in Europe

Connor (Metcalfe) is getting stronger and stronger and quicker and quicker physically, you can see, you know, playing in Germany every week, he's improving not only technically but his physical aspect as well and he's doing exceptionally well. But the boys are doing well, Awer Mabil scored two goals and an assists on the weekend as well, and it's great to have him back in camp. I have changed the structure a little bit when I say that, the selection of the squad that you know, against Argentina and Mexico, we went with more midfielders and no wingers because they were injured or weren't playing. But this time we've got a number of the wingers back and we've gone more with them this time.

Arnold on facing England at Wembley

My preference straight after the World Cup when I re-signed was to play against top opposition, because it's the only way you learn from your mistakes. And I think that was the biggest thing we learned from playing against France in the first game at the World Cup, a small mistake turns into a big mistake, and we get punished for it. And now if you play against easy opposition, you don't learn and we've had these games against Ecuador and Argentina and Mexico and they've been fantastic for the boys. And this is our first camp back that we've got two games in a week and it'll  test the depth more of the squad, rather than one game and it's a fantastic opportunity. Playing here in England, the rivalry that we have against England and in sport, not just football it's going to be fantastic. And to have an occasion at Wembley where the Socceroos have never played before it's going to be extra special. So I'm looking forward to first and foremost a great performance by the boys and winning the game.

Arnold on tapping into the rivalry

I did a bit of media the other day, English media, and they're still talking about Upton Park in 2003 and how we beat them 3-1 and that's the type of rivalry that you need as well for that excitement and as I said we're looking extremely forward to the game and improving on our performances.

Arnold on playing New Zealand 

They're two derbies you know if you can have derbies in international football, and we've had a great relationship with New Zealand over the years, playing in Oceania, and we obviously moved into Asia and we haven't played them that often. We played them twice last year and that was first time in maybe 10 years. So it'd be great to have that derby game and we look forward to it.

Upcoming matches

England v Australia - International Friendly
Friday, 13 October
Wembley Stadium, London UK
Kick-off: 7.45pm local / 5.45am AEDT (Saturday, 14 October)

Australia v New Zealand - International Friendly
Tuesday, 17 October     
Gtech Community Stadium, Brentford, London UK     
Kick-off: 7.45pm local / 5.45am AEDT (Wednesday, 18 October)  
Tickets: Purchase Here

The upcoming Subway Socceroos matches will be broadcast live and exclusive on 10, 10 Play and Paramount+.
As always check your local guides.