Young Socceroos defeated by CA Tiro Federal

The Australian Men’s Under 20 Football Team, the Qantas Young Socceroos, have been defeated 1-2 by Argentinean club team C.A. Tiro Federal in their second match of the Copa Ciudad de Rosario in Argentina.

A late change meant that instead of facing the USA as originally scheduled, the Qantas Young Socceroos faced C.A. Tiro Federal instead. North Queensland Fury’s Osama Malik made his international debut and Nikola Stanojevic made his first appearance for the Qantas Young Socceroos in this second match of the tour.

Tiro Federal opened the scoring in the fifth minute when an early attack forced Qantas Young Socceroos goal-keeper Alex Cisak to make a great save, but unfortunately the ball rebounded into the path or a Tiro Federal striker who calmly tapped in from close range.

The Qantas Young Socceroos equalised in the 18th minute when Rocco Visconte made a run from half way down the left side to the edge of the box and played in a looping cross to far post. Chris Payne was on hand to connect and head in his first international goal.

Tiro Federal took the lead two minutes later following an error by Matt Jurman at the back that gave Tiro Federal another one-on-one opportunity against Cisak. Cisak again saved the first attempt but could not back up to save the rebounded shot.

The second half saw the Qantas Young Socceroos push hard for another the equaliser, but to no avail, even with Tiro Federal losing a player to a red card after a dangerous tackle on Sam Munro late in the game.

Qantas Young Socceroos Head Coach Jan Versleijen was disappointed with the result after the match, but was positive about the lessons learned.

"We learnt a valuable lesson tonight. When you play against South American teams like this they run and work hard for 90 minutes and they put a lot of pressure on you”, said Versleijen.

“Individual mistakes cost us the game and in the second half we didn't create enough chances to equalise.

“It was another good experience to play at this level and expose the players to what they will come up against at the World Cup," concluded Versleijen.

The Qantas Young Socceroos will play the USA U-20 National team on Wednesday 29 July in their final match of the tournament.

The Argentinean tour is the final warm-up for the Qantas Young Socceroos before the FIFA U-20 World Cup which will be held in Egypt from 24 September to 16 October. Australia has drawn Brazil, Costa Rica and the Czech Republic in the group stage.