Match Preview: Australia vs Indonesia | AFC Asian Cup Qatar 2023™ Round of 16

The Subway Socceroos will be looking to lock in a fourth consecutive quarter-final berth when they face Indonesia on Sunday night (10:30pm AEDT) at the Jassim Bin Hamad Stadium in Doha.

• READ MORE: How To Watch: Australia vs Indonesia | AFC Asian Cup Qatar 2023™
• READ MORE: Our last three meetings against Indonesia

Australia will do the honour of kicking off the Asian Cup 2023 Qatar™ knockout stages, when they face local rivals Indonesia at the Jassim Bin Hamad stadium, the ground where the green and gold defeated Syria during the group-stage.

Finishing top of Group B, the green and gold were forced to traverse what was considered the hardest group of the tournament. A comfortable 2-0 win against India, was followed by a 1-0 victory against Syria, and a crucial point against Uzbekistan.

The side standing between the Socceroos and a quarter final spot, is 144th placed Indonesia. However, do not let their ranking fool you, the nation's footballing national team had to start from scratch less than a decade ago after a FIFA suspension. 

Since then, 'Team Garuda' have enjoyed a meteoric rise, with an incredibly talented and youthful core spurring in the next generation.

Front of that resurgence, is 19-year-old golden boy Marselino Ferdinand, who plies his trade in Belgium with K.M.S.K. Deinze. The forward has already made his mark in the group stages, creating great difficulties for an Iraq defence that topped their group, along with Premier League defender Takehiro Tomiyasu.

Tweet: https://twitter.com/Socceroos/status/1751027518336012675

Australia will be confident in holding out Indonesia's attacking weapons, having conceded just one goal all tournament so far, a tally only broken by hosts Qatar, and surprise packet Thailand.

The Socceroos also possess a strong record against Indonesia, a side they have met plenty of times over the 102 years of the national team's existence, defeating the side in red 11 times in 15 meetings.

The last competitive fixture between the two sides came all the way back in 2010, where Australia qualified for the 2011 Asian Cup with a 1-0 win over Indonesia at Suncorp Stadium, following a 0-0 draw in the corresponding fixture.

Like the previous encounter a year earlier, Pim Verbeek relied heavily on Aussies playing domestically but did call up four overseas based members in Luke Wilkshire, Josh Kennedy, Mark Milligan and Jade North. 

And it was two of those players playing abroad who played a major role in the decisive opener. Wilkshire's set-piece was headed onto the crossbar by Milligan, who had the presence of mind to follow up and quickly swivel his body to steer home the rebound on a tight angle for his first Socceroos goal.

FIFA World Rankings

Australia: 25 (7 Places higher than 2019 Asian Cup)

Indonesia: 146

Head-to-head

Played: 15
Wins: 11
Draws: 3
Losses: 1

Insights

• The Socceroos are unbeaten in seven matches, winning six and drawing once in the process
• Indonesia has won just one of their last five matches - a 1-0 victory against Vietnam, losing the remaining four
• Jordan Bos has attempted 13 dribbles thus far in the Asian Cup, succeeding at six
• Keanu Baccus made 25 passes into the final third in the tournament across his 199 minutes so far - an average of 11.3 per 90
• In his last seven matches for the Socceroos, Harry Souttar has kept six clean sheets, scored three goals, and completed 533 passes - 79 of which have been into the final third
• A new national team record was broken in the 36th minute against Uzbekistan, as the current squad surpassed 609 minutes without conceding in all competitions, breaking the total set by the 2008 squad.
• Only one goal was conceded in three matches, which equals the 2011 campaign, however the 260 minutes which it took for an opposition team to score, is the longest of any Asian Cup campaign.
• No player has made more passes in this Asian Cup then Australia's central defender Harry Souttar (315 passes).
• The Socceroos' dominance with the ball at their feet is highlighted by the fact they have five players in the top ten for passes completed, with Souttar, Aziz Behich (231), Kye Rowles (205 in 2 games), Jackson Irvine (171), and Keanu Baccus (171) rounding out the list.

Upcoming Milestone

The match will also be Graham Arnold's 50th in charge of the Socceroos in his second stint since returning in 2018:

Games coached since October 2018: 

49 games
32 wins
10 draws
7 losses
Goals for 95
Goals against 35

What They Said

Maty Ryan

“The first piece of the puzzle, finishing top of the group, was the most important at this stage of the competition. We can be proud of that. I feel like we’re building into the tournament nicely. And we’ll go and analyse this and recover from tonight’s match and look forward to the next one.”

It’s important to learn from the lessons that we got tonight, and the better that we can do, the stronger we’ll be moving forward."

“That's going to be the messages that are going to be driven now moving forward is to learn from each experience, and in each game in the moments within that to make yourself stronger, and we’ll come out hungry for the next one.”

Harry Souttar

“Obviously, we know it's going to be knock out football, so there's no room for error. A new challenge for us, we got a couple of days to prepare for the game and I'm sure we'll be watching clips and kind of practicing and training in the next couple of days ready to go.”

“I truly believe that every time we get a set piece that we're going to create a chance at least. Obviously we've kind of got to make a little improvement, since the first game on it, I think we've had a few chances and I've certainly had a few chances that I feel I could have done better in the last two games. But certainly one (area) I love that as a team that we've got a real chance of scoring.”

“We can take the positives and we can learn from certain areas of our game that we maybe need to improve on going forward. I think there's an all-round kind of improvement that we're certainly aware of, moving forward into the competition with higher calibre teams. But it's knockout football and wins are a must.”

Kye Rowles

"Everyone's really focused, and we've been working on a couple of things out on the training pitch. So there's a lot of excitement going around."

"They're going to fight tooth and nail, they're going to bring a lot of energy, they have that quality going forward as well, with some of their individuals. So we've got to be diligent in our work defensively. But yeah just mostly they're going to bring the energy, try and be physical and it's going to be a very tough game."

Martin Boyle

“The first part of what we wanted to achieve, we've done, we wanted to top the group which we've managed. There's no room for error now straight to knockout football and every little mistake, we can be punished for it, so we know what we have to do, and we have to keep progressing.”

“I'm really enjoying it, I've woke up every morning with a smile on my face and my family are buzzing, the teammates are really happy for me. Missing two tournaments was a major shock to me and I'm glad to be here and I'm glad to be contributing as well at the same time. Hopefully I can step up another gear and keep providing, it's nice to get a goal, so hopefully I can produce a lot more on that side of things."

“We have another gear to step up and I feel like we are dominating the games, we are keeping control of the ball, and we are creating all the chances, I think we just need to be a bit more ruthless at the other end."
 

AFC ASIAN CUP QATAR 2023™ ROUND OF 16

Every AFC Asian Cup Qatar 2023 match will be live on Paramount+