They did really well though
96/06/02 (Sun)
rec.sport.soccer
============================

 In Article <4os08c$25m@freenet-news.carleton.ca>
   FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Chuck Penfold) wrote:
> I woke up at 5.00 am to watch this?

  I stayed up until 4:30, PST, to watch this :-).

> It`s a shame, this Canadian team just doesn`t have it.  They had one
> decent chance in the whole game, and the striker, I think it was Thompson,
> put a weak shot well wide.   A couple of years ago the full national side
> played the Ozzies even through the qualifying for the WC `94, then lost on
> penalties.  This Olympic side though, doesn`t even seem to belong on the
> same park as the Ozzies.  They were trying to play long balls a lot of the
> time, long balls to yellow shirts.  It was painful to watch, especially at
> that time on a Sunday morning.

  They did really well though, I think they've done better than they
would have done against that brilliant Ozzie team. Really, I've seen
all the Japan's qualifying games and all the Canada's this spring,
and the Ozzies looked much stronger than Japan, Korea, Saudi Arabia,
and even looked better than unmotivated Mexico against Canada in the
CONCACAF qualifier final. The Canadians didn't give up until the very
end, that was something.

  Under that fierce pressure by the Ozzies in the midfield, it was
apparent that Canada had nothing to depend on except the long balls.
I thought they wouldn't want to use long balls if they had alternatives,
but well, what else they could do at that phase, as they didn't seem
to have great dribbling/short-passing skills.

  .....And that Viduka's great goal was a last straw, poor little captain
Hikida really got crushed at the moment.

  All in all, I was totally impressed by this Australian team.
Congratulations. And if I see the young Canadians somewhere in
Vancouver, I want to say "well done" to them :-).

  -----------------------------
   Tomohisa Sakata (Vancouver)
  -----------------------------