Picking out highlights from a hundred years of the Socceroos? That’s a big ask.
For starters, most of us weren’t around to witness most of that century – and that number of years whittles away even further for blow-ins like me, who didn’t arrive until 2003.
Plenty has been packed into the last two decades, undoubtedly the national team's second “golden era” following on from Rale Rasic’s trailblazers in 1974. Yet even as someone who has had the privilege of commentating well over a hundred national team games, choosing only one special moment is impossible. John Aloisi’s penalty? Tim Cahill’s double? James Troisi’s Asian Cup Final winner? There are simply too many.
They are also moments we all shared collectively as broadcasters, as viewers, as fans. Iconic as they may be, for the purposes of this article, I would prefer to share what I consider two of my own favourite memories of life with the Socceroos…especially as I believe it represents the essence of what those early pioneers set out to do in 1922.
Namely, to connect Australia with the world, through football.
When Alec Gibb led out the team in Dunedin, he would probably have had no idea that he was setting in train a process that would lead to Australian footballers becoming household names, wherever they played. Don’t believe me? Here’s one story from 2009 that proves the point.
Australia were playing Uzbekistan in Tashkent. We journalists landed late in the night, and were delayed further by the absence of a passport officer to stamp our visas. By the time we emerged from the airport, it was close to 2am.
The place was deserted, save for a couple of rather ancient looking taxis. We grabbed one, squeezed our suitcases into the boot, and informed our snaggle-toothed driver of the destination.
The front windscreen of his car was badly cracked, making clear vision impossible, so our driver simply navigated the way with his head out of the window. After five minutes of silence however, he was clearly inquisitive as to where his passengers hailed from, and so, he bobbed his head back inside to ask us a question.
“Which country, you?” he asked in faltering English.
“Australia” we replied.
He thought for a minute, then it dawned on him we were there for the forthcoming World Cup qualifier. A big smile came over his face, and he began to reel off the names of the Socceroos stars of the time.
“Harry Kew-well!”
“Mark Wee-dooka!”
“Tim Carr-heel!”
“Mark Shwazzer!”
For our driver, Australia was probably no more of a dot on the map than Uzbekistan was to us – but he knew our footballers. That’s the power of the national team.
Similarly, six years later we ventured into nearby Kyrgyzstan for another qualifier that was a real trip into the unknown.
Yet if Bishkek was a mystery to those visiting from down under, the locals certainly knew all about us. This was the biggest game in their history – the first time they had ever done a live football game for an overseas audience as a host broadcaster. Tickets were sold out days in advance for a game against the (then) champions of Asia.
On the day of the game, those without tickets weren’t going to be denied – they simply poured over the low walls around the apron of the ground like ants. All eager to catch a glimpse of Australia’s stars, and Mat Ryan and Mile Jedinak in particular. The official crowd that day was 18,000, but there must have been many more.
I remember sitting in our rickety commentary position (two balsawood boards precariously perched over two rows of seating), looking out over the scene. The imposing Kyrgyz Parliament building towered over the stadium in the background. Stood nearby was an industrial plant that was belching out thick black smoke. To our right stood the serene and silent Ala Too Mountain range, its peaks flecked with snow, even in late summer.
It was a vista as foreign to Australian eyes as it could possibly be – yet there were 11 men wearing green & gold below us in this alien landscape, who were very much the star attraction.
Perhaps fixtures – and stories - such as these, are the final proof that Australia has found its place in the world through football.
For years, the country remained on the periphery – outside FIFA (and for three years, suspended from it), then marooned for decades in the Oceania Confederation. Marginalised by colonial baggage (initially) and by the tyranny of distance, subsequently.
In 1922, the world was a much bigger place. Australia’s early attempts to connect with the rest of the world was via the Anglo world that was virtually its only overseas connection. They tried time & again to get an English touring team to come to Australia, without success. This is what led to that inaugural series against New Zealand, who’d been similarly frustrated.
In November, Australia will play at a fifth consecutive World Cup, in a country that was still part of the Trucial States when Bill Maunder was netting the nation’s first-ever international goal.
Australia’s touring party in 1922 contained players from just two states. A hundred years on, the squad that went to Qatar for the Peru play-off was drawn from players plying their trade in eleven different countries.
The globalisation of Australian football is seemingly complete – but every journey begins with a single step. That step began in 1922, and those pioneers will never be forgotten.