Pressure builds on Graham Arnold as Socceroos slump to Saudi Arabia defeat

In the end, it really should have surprised no one that Graham Arnold constructed his own reality in the build-up to the Socceroos 1-0 loss to Saudi Arabia. “I’ve been around the national team now for 40 years and I’ve never known a game to be a dead rubber,” he declared. “It’s more about going out against this team that’s qualified for a World Cup and showing our worth, and giving an opportunity for these players to step up and for them to push for a position in the playoff squad.”

Yet despite any contortions in logic to argue otherwise, a dead rubber is exactly what this match was. A 2-0 defeat against Japan the previous week meant that, no matter the result in Jeddah, the Socceroos knew the fate of their qualification campaign now lay in the playoff path. Meanwhile, the Green Falcons were safe in the knowledge that their ticket to Qatar 2022 – as symbolised by the large jumbo jet tifo erected in the stands – was already punched.

And while the Socceroos had their moments – able to play as the reactive team to fashion threatening chances in transition, including an incredibly tight offside call that disallowed a Martin Boyle goal – Salem Al-Dawsari’s 65th-minute penalty ensured that it would be the hosts who took a comfortable win and first place in Group B. Australia has now won just one of their last seven World Cup qualifiers; a tailspin in form that both probably should have been seen coming and will now force them to secure a fifth-straight World Cup apparence the hard way.

Ostensibly, dead rubbers such as Wednesday remove the risks associated with what would otherwise be a competitive fixture. They are an opportunity, as Arnold said, to blood younger or more inexperienced talent against a higher quality