{"id":712453,"date":"2026-06-03T11:22:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-03T11:22:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/712453\/"},"modified":"2026-06-03T11:22:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-03T11:22:10","slug":"fifa-world-cup-2026-former-us-player-alexi-lalas-takes-swipe-at-average-socceroos","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/712453\/","title":{"rendered":"FIFA World Cup 2026: Former US player Alexi Lalas takes swipe at \u2018average\u2019 Socceroos"},"content":{"rendered":"

A retired United States footballer turned pundit believes Socceroos goalkeeper Mat Ryan will have to do some heavy lifting at the FIFA World Cup<\/a>, in what is the latest barb fired by the host nation towards the Australian side.<\/p>\n

The fuse was lit by former players on the day the World Cup draw was unveiled, with Mike Grella labelling Australia<\/a> as a \u2018lay-up\u2019 in the United States\u2019 draw<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"Alexi<\/p>\n

Alexi Lalas speaks on his podcast about the Australian Socceroos.\u00a0X\/@SOTUWithAlexi<\/p>\n

Alexi Lalas had a similar stance to Grella when diving into the group stage draw on his podcast this week, with the former US centre-back all but certain that Australia does not have the strike power to take on \u201cthe elites\u201d of the football world. <\/p>\n

The likes of Brazil, Argentina, England, Spain and France most notably would fall under that category in the eyes of international football fans. <\/p>\n

And even though the Socceroos have proven nations who underestimated them wrong in the past<\/a>, Lalas fears the squad Tony Popovic<\/a> has named is too weak to go deep in football\u2019s biggest tournament. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis is an average team by any measure, and certainly not a great team,\u201d he said, speaking on his State of the Union podcast.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think in their region in Asia – that move has helped them, but against better quality competition and the elites of the world, they can\u2019t play the way that they play in their region – but that applies to a lot of teams out there.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is a team that is going to look to frustrate most of the opponents … but they are going to struggle to score goals and maintain possession of the ball. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey are going to have to adjust, and I think they will default into a very defensive type of team. <\/p>\n

\u201cThey have a great legend in goals in Maty Ryan, a wonderful goalkeeper. I think he is going to have to stand on his head at different times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ryan is heading to his fourth World Cup, one of only four Australian players to do so in the game\u2019s history. Mathew Leckie will join him in achieving that feat.<\/p>\n

\"Mat<\/p>\n

Mat Ryan in action in the Frecciarossa Italian Cup.\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n

Australia will face the US on June 20 (AEST) in Seattle in their second game. <\/p>\n

While that match is one that will draw great attraction on Aussie soil, Lalas declared the marquee game in Group D is actually against Paraguay. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf the US gets the three points in that (Paraguay game), we are off to the races and we will win the group,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf we don\u2019t (win), all hell is going to break loose. People will be really worried.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lalas played 96 games for the US during a seven-year international career.<\/p>\n

Australia kick off their campaign against Turkey on Sunday, June 14 (AEST).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A retired United States footballer turned pundit believes Socceroos goalkeeper Mat Ryan will have to do some heavy…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":712454,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[563],"tags":[64,63,596,85],"class_list":["post-712453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-football","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-football","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=712453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/712453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/712454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=712453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=712453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=712453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}