The Socceroos vs Croatia: It’s a night out at the pokies for these lads

Mark Viduka, Socceroo captain meets his former country in the World Cup
So, now that Harry Kewell has been cleared of a charge of abusing the referee (Harry is very, very, very, very sorry about it….sort of) after Australia’s 2-0 loss to Brazil, at least the Australian team has one player who’s not of Croatian parentage, ready to line up against Croatia in their final group match. Actually come to think about it, Harry’s parents are English and this lineage stuff is all getting a bit confusing anyway. The “how do we milk this funny soccer bandwagon” news angle in Australia this week leading into the Oz Versus Croatia game, is that 11 of the players across the two teams were born in Australia to Croatian parents – seven in the Australian team and four in the Croatian squad. A few of the Croatian players even honed their skills at the Australian Institute of Sport as youngsters. Apparently some of those now playing for Croatia originally wanted to play for Australia but got tired of waiting for the call up so opted for the “old country” as a means of making it in big time international football……or at least thats one story (but this is a blog and I’ve heard that lazy, unresearched stories are a good way of breaking up all that other pompous stuff that gets written by people who have an unhealthy number of facts at their fingertips). Anyway the thing is, for a few players at least, there was a very fine line between playing for Australia and playing for the country of their ancestry. This is even emphasised by the fact the head of the Australian Players Federation who was instrumental in putting the case to FIFA that got Kewell off, is the brother of one of the current Croatian players….”Go figure!” (as you Americans reading this so quaintly say). And finally just to top it all off theres just been a story in the news today that police have stationed guards outside, Australian Captain Mark Viduka’s villa in Dubrovnik, in case things turn nasty if Australia knocks the Croats out at the group stage. And why would Viduka choose to have a villa in Croatia? Because after Australia wins the World Cup he’s going back there for a holiday and will drive around with the trophy stuck to the bonnet of his Porsche as a message to all those Croatian-born kids of Australian parents living in the country – “Choose your allegiance carefully!”