{"id":401802,"date":"2024-06-11T04:40:46","date_gmt":"2024-06-11T04:40:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=401802"},"modified":"2024-06-11T05:04:51","modified_gmt":"2024-06-11T05:04:51","slug":"socceroos-v-nobody-uzzie-confused-by-anomaly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/?p=401802","title":{"rendered":"'Socceroos v Nobody?': Uzzie 'confused' by anomaly"},"content":{"rendered":"

A\ufeffustralian Test<\/a> opener Usman Khawaja<\/a> has hit out at the "confusing" disconnect between football and politics ahead of the Socceroos<\/a>' FIFA World Cup<\/a> qualifier.<\/p>\n

Australia will play Pa\ufefflestine in Perth on Tuesday night, but the Australian government does not recognise Palestine as a state.<\/p>\n

"I'm confused how we are playing a country that our government doesn't even recognise," Khawaja said in an Instagram post on Tuesday morning.<\/p>\n

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READ MORE:\ufeff<\/strong> Former champ claps back at 'unprofessional' Ricciardo<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

"Is this Socceroos v Nobody? It's all very confusing."<\/p>\n

\ufeffKhawaja has been outspoken about the ongoing Israel-Palestine conflict since Hamas' October 7 attack.<\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/p\/C8DVcNhv_An\/?utm_source=ig_embed&amp<\/a><\/p>\n

He was last summer blocked by the ICC from displaying a peace symbol on his bat<\/a>, and also from wearing shoes with pro-Palestine messages<\/a> and colours. He wore a black armband \ufeffinstead, and was sanctioned.<\/p>\n

\ufeffKhawaja later released a line of t-shirts featuring a picture of the shoes he was banned from wearing<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Khawaja's latest post featured a photo of the Palestinian team wearing their distinctive uniforms.<\/p>\n

\"Usman<\/p>\n

"Can't wait for this. Palestinian flags will be flying everywhere … and they can't ban them," he said in reference to the shoes.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, Socceroos coach Graham Arnold<\/a> confirmed there would be nine changes to the side that beat Bangladesh 2-0 in Dhaka last week<\/a>.<\/p>\n

For the Socceroos, the match against Palestine is effectively a dead rubber. They have already secured passage to the third round of qualifying having won each of their five second round matches.<\/p>\n

\"Players<\/p>\n

"It's about winning, but this window for me is also about testing some players and looking at the players in a different way of moving forward," Arnold said.<\/p>\n

"I'm happy with where we're at with the depth of the squad.<\/p>\n

"When I first started five, six years ago, if you put the starting eleven against the reserves, it could have been two or three nil for the starting eleven.<\/p>\n

\"Kusini<\/p>\n

"Whereas I think these days the starting eleven against the subs, it's 0-0, it's a tough game."<\/p>\n

Australia won the reverse fixture in Kuwait last November 1-0\ufeff.<\/p>\n

The team is yet to concede a goal in any match in this stage – a record Arnold wants to keep intact.<\/p>\n

"My expectations are always high for everyone. There'll be no confusion. It will be a very well prepared team that will put in a great performance," he said.<\/p>\n

\"Graham<\/p>\n

"My goal for the players is to keep another clean sheet and go through this whole phase with no goals against.<\/p>\n

"I think there's only been three teams in the history of AFC football that have done that in this phase."\ufeff<\/p>\n

Kickoff is at 10.10pm AEST, 8.10pm AWST.\ufeff<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A\ufeffustralian Test opener Usman Khawaja has hit out at the "confusing" disconnect between football and politics ahead of the Socceroos' FIFA World Cup qualifier. Australia […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":401804,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401802"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=401802"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401802\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":401808,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401802\/revisions\/401808"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/401804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=401802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=401802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sportinfo.pro\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=401802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}