Maty Ryan says Socceroos confident of bouncing back against Indonesia
Subway Socceroos captain Maty Ryan insists the team is determined to bounce back from their frustrating loss to Bahrain when they take on Indonesia in their second FIFA World Cup 2026™ Third Round Qualifier in Group C.
The Aussies will be after a response against the Garuda Team in order to get their qualifying campaign back on track on Tuesday, 10 September at 10:00pm AEST.
This is not the first time Australia has faced adversity on the journey to qualifying for a FIFA World Cup, and according to Ryan, it is about how the team overcome and deal with the setback moving forward.
As he suggested, that ability to quickly move on and bounce back from the negative result is a skill set in itself.
The AS Roma goalkeeper affirmed the squad is embracing the challenge of delivering a much improved performance, but equally aware it will not be easy in front of what is expected to be a hostile atmosphere containing more than 75,000 fans at the Gelora Bung Karno Stadium.
On the mood in the camp…
I think experience within the game and life experience itself teaches you to respond in the strongest and most efficient way when you face a bit of adversity, and that's obviously, definitely been the focus since the result the other night.
On overcoming adversity…
I mean it's a facet of life, adversity and when you face it and how you deal with it. It's a real skill set when you are able to respond and bounce back swiftly. That's the full focus now and the boys are obviously looking forward to the challenge. Anytime we get to pull on that Socceroos jersey and be here in camp is a great opportunity for us, individually and collectively. Like I said, we're trying to learn from our experience the other night and use that moving forward to become better and stronger.
On approaching matches with the right mentality…
The mentality we always try and approach for every game is to respect every opposition we're playing, and that's exactly what they deserve. If you go into a game, with the wrong amount of respect, whether it's respecting someone too much or not respecting someone enough, then it could be detrimental either way through being complacent or through, I guess a fear factor in giving someone too much time on the ball, or a team too much time and too much respect - and that can be detrimental that way also. So first and foremost, we always approach the game, and we speak about it collectively, about making sure that we're focused on that aspect and give the right amount of respect that the opposite opposition deserves. And for this Indonesia game it's going to be no different. There's going to be a big crowd, they showed their qualities, not only against Saudi Arabia recently, but obviously in the past as well. And our focus is turning to them and coming up with a game plan to deliver the result for us and obviously Australia.
On tricks to overcome jet lag...
I mean probably each individual has their own little thing that maybe works for them but for myself I really try to battle through. I guess there's the appeal of trying to sleep during the day, but as soon as I leave my club overseas, I'm trying to get on the time zone of where we're going to play the game and all that straight away. Just trying to keep busy throughout the day to get to a point of the night time where I can sleep through the night, and get on the schedule of obviously being over here, and I feel that works for me.
On the flight across here yesterday, obviously, a few guys opted to sleep and all that. But for myself, I wanted to make sure that I would get through last night with a good sleep and whatnot. I stayed awake on the flight the whole time and kept busy and had a few conversations with guys on the plane and just talking about football and life and all that type of stuff. I had a really good sleep last night, and I'm sure the other boys did with their own approaches as well. But for me, I think it's around the sleeping, not trying to continue on a European time zone or nothing like that, just trying to get in here and get on the schedule over here.
On Arnie's approach and how the team review games...
Arnie's approach is a very open one. Obviously, he has his skills and expertise that have delivered success for himself as a manager and the teams that he's coached. In my opinion, his approach is a very open one in that he has his own opinions and what he forms from what he sees and what he watches back. But he also likes to get the sensations that we're feeling out on the field, in order to get the whole grasp on obviously how it unfolded, both in positive performance and results and the contrary, like a result and a performance the other night. So, you know, there's been initial discussions, and it's obviously very easy immediately after the game, to be caught up in the emotions and all that follows the game. And obviously there were a few negative ones from our lack of satisfaction at how we played the other night.
I think when you get those couple days after a game, when you're in a camp like this, and you have obviously time to let the dust settle on that, and you get your composure about yourself again. You look through things, you can quite often have a little bit of a different opinion from the match, a couple of days later. But all in all, the point I'm trying to make is that Arnie's approach is that he likes to get a full picture on everything that unfolded. No doubt he's going to be presenting us with some constructive criticism today in order to be better and make it stronger and we'll be better for it moving forward.
On the Dutch influence in the Indonesia squad...
We know ourselves obviously with the Australian National Team and we've had obviously a heavy Dutch influence in the past as well. I mean, we know that they're a very technical nation. They love to play, obviously, the modern game of football, and it's very technically reliant. At least that's my observation of my time around Dutch football. And you know, that's what we're expecting Tuesday night. In regards to the respect of the opposition, we know that they're going to have quality that can hurt us if we're not on our game and we don't, take away the opportunity for them to do that through how we can play. We're focused on us and what we need to do, and we're confident as a squad that we can rebound from the result the other night and take a step, a positive step towards this qualification.
Match Details
Indonesia v Subway Socceroos
Tuesday 10 September 2024
Gelora Bung Karno Stadium, Jakarta
Kick-off: 7.00pm local / 10.00pm AEST
Broadcast: Paramount+