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Australia 2-0 Bahrain: Second String, Similar Success

A Socceroos side made up mainly of second string players continued Australia’s excellent form in the World Cup qualifiers, with a 2-0 over Bahrain on Wednesday night.

With Saturday’s draw against Qatar enough to see them through to South Africa 2010, Pim Verbeek experimented with some fringe players.

There were some familiar faces on hand though, with Schwarzer and Kewell both starting, along with regular first team stars Culina and Wilkshire, the latter returning after a suspension.

As one might have expected, regardless of the strength of the lineup, the home side proved to be the stronger team throughout most of the match.

They took a deserved lead 10 minutes into the second half, with Mile Sterjovski capitalising upon some poor defending to slash home a half volley from within the 18 yard box.

With just two minutes to go, Jason Culina nearly finished off a nice passage of build-up play with a stunning overhead kick. Although flying well past Sayed Jaffer in the Bahrain goal, it couldn’t evade the post. Nonetheless, Sheffield United’s David Carney was on hand to slam home the rebound to make it 2-0 to Australia.

The Socceroos probably should have scored more, but the victory keeps them top of Group A, and saw them maintain their run of clean sheets in this final stage of the qualifying process.

David Carney swept home the Socceroos’ second

Goalkeeper Mark Schwarzer praised the way his side has gone about qualifying for the finals.

The Fulham shotstopper told ESPN: “I’m extremely proud (of) the way the whole team and management have gone about their job the whole campaign, they’ve been extremely professional.”

“I think if we can push on again against Japan and keep another clean sheet, we can’t do any better than that.”

Asian Qualifying Stage 4, Group A after June 10
Table After June 10

With the Aussies now two points clear of Japan on top of the qualifying group, it appears that they will be heading to South Africa in style. However Japan will try and take top spot for themselves when the two sides meet in Melbourne next Wednesday.

Bahrain will fight it out with Uzbekistan to win the play-off spot, which will see one of them face a team from the Oceania qualifying area for a place in the World Cup.

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