Tokyo Olympics 2021: Graham Arnold’s Olympic dream has a World Cup focus

The reason why Olyroos coach Graham Arnold will not refer to his team’s Olympic opponents by name.

Melbourne City’s Lachie Wales in action for the Olyroos against New Zealand on Monday Picture: Getty Images

Olyroos coach Graham Arnold expects a handful of Australian Olyroos will play their way into his Socceroos squad for the World Cup after competing in what he calls the Olympic “group of dreams”.

Arnold, the Socceroos head coach, has also taken on the role for the Olympic team for free, to promote players from the junior ranks into the senior team. Despite the tough draw he has refused to talk about the Olyroos’s high calibre rivals, Argentina, Spain and Egypt, instead calling them “opponents’’.

Speaking from the team’s pre-Olympic training base in Japan, Arnold said: “People want to call it the group of death but for me it’s the group of dreams because here is what dreams are made of.

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“It’s a great, great story that you can tell one day about when you walked on and played against these teams at the Olympic Games.

“I removed all those names because those nations have a big name and had great players in the past. We’re not playing against those great players in the past, we’re playing a new group of players that are human beings, that’s 11 versus 11 … the brand of the country and the history of the country can get into the subconscious mind and affect the players.

“By removing that identity I don’t expect to walk through the tunnel already one-nil down. When we walk out its an even playing field, it’s just an opponent and we play three opponents and I expect to win.”

Arnold has drawn on the Socceroos’ history and its depth talent when the country competed in every Olympics from Seoul 1988 through to Beijing 2008.

Olyroos head coach Graham Arnold ahead of a friendly match between Australia and New Zealand in Ichihara on Monday Picture: Getty Images

“That’s why I decided to take the Olympic team on when it wasn’t my job and honestly I’m here as a volunteer. I am here to help the kids and the game. I truly believe the strength of the Socceroos is linked to the juniors … after two years of hard work into this Olympic team, we are getting there.’’

Arnold said after a successful Olympic tournament five or six of these players will pretty much be in Qatar next year or will be knocking on the door of the senior squad.

“When I took this over I reflected on the old days and that golden generation that everyone wants to talk about was (because) they had one coach for both teams and that was Eddie Thomson. He coached the Socceroos and Olyroos and built the same culture within the two teams, same messaging. When the young kids came into play for the Socceroos they didn’t feel inferior at all, they knew they belonged.

“So after this Olympics I see that five or six players will be stepping up into the Socceroos.”

Arnold also believes the Olympics will reinvigorate the careers of players like Daniel Arzani, who was the young gun at the last World Cup but has since struggled at European clubs.

“It’s a relaunch for him,’’ Arnold said. And being forced to rely on much younger players because 75 per cent of the European clubs refused to release older-age players for the Olympics, coupled with complications about quarantine for senior Socceroos made “it a little easier” to remove all over-age players from the Olyroos except for the Sydney Wanderers striker Mitchell Duke, 30.

Arnold said that the pandemic had helped the Olyroo team because the A-League salary cap was slashed to about $1.2m, forcing the clubs to use younger players.

Said Arnold: “When I took them to Thailand and we qualified for the Olympics last January they were hardly playing football in the A-League. There were a handful of them. Now this year the success of the A-League has been around the young kids who have come in and played and done a great job.

“We are in better shape than what we would have been this time last year. The delay of the Olympics for a year because of Covid has meant the clubs have played the kids and they are in much better shape today than what they would have been, and that is such a positive in that sense.”