Graham Arnold Confident of Coping with Packed Fixture List

Australia national team coach Graham Arnold says that the national team is very confident about keeping up with the tight schedule that is expected as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

All forms of football have been suspended up until now, but it is slowly resuming in many parts of the world. Even Australia have had their World Cup qualification and Copa America games against Chinese Taipei, Jordan, Paraguay, Bolivia, and Uruguay suspended as a result. All these matches are expected to be resumed in the short while when things are given a go-ahead.

This will result in a condensed schedule so that things can be completed before the World Cup 2022, which will be held in Qatar. Even though the fixture schedule may be altered in such a way that friendly games are taken out of the way, it will still mean a lot of games in a very short spell of time. However,Arnold is confident that a bumper fixture list can be managed by the team due to the strength in depth. In recent times, many high-profile Australian names have retired. The likes of Tim Cahill would fall in the category, but such retirements have resulted in many young players getting into the national team.

Unlike the older players, young players will be able to cope up more with a packed fixture schedule since their recovery times are better.“I knew from what I saw that pretty much we as a country only had trust in 12 or 13 players.You can't get through that. When players retire, you need more players to step up.For me it was about creating depth and the depth would be needed by 2021 for the third phase of our World Cup qualifiers and moving into Qatar,” said Arnold about the upcoming fixture list.