{"id":719159,"date":"2026-06-06T14:40:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-06T14:40:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/719159\/"},"modified":"2026-06-06T14:40:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-06T14:40:10","slug":"exclusive-interview-cristian-volpato-explains-why-he-chose-australia","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/719159\/","title":{"rendered":"Exclusive Interview: Cristian Volpato explains why he chose Australia"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Cristian Volpato spoke exclusively to Football Australia after officially being announced in the CommBank Socceroos squad ahead of the FIFA World Cup 2026\u2122\ufe0f.\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/bit.ly\/SOC-26-Home-Kit\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\"><\/p>\n<p>              <img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/new_kit_banner_v2.jpg\" alt=\"new_kit_banner_v2.jpg\"\/><\/p>\n<p><\/a><\/p>\n<p>After switching allegiance from Italy to Australia, Volpato opens up on the decision to represent the country where he grew up, the feeling of wearing green and gold, and why now felt like the right time to \u201ccome home\u201d.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p>The forward also discusses settling into camp, the support from his new teammates, his relationship with Alessandro Circati, working under Tony Popovic, and his ambition to help Australia make an impact on football\u2019s biggest stage.<\/p>\n<p>Watch in the header above or player below.<\/p>\n<p>Cristian Volpato explains why he chose Australia | Exclusive CommBank Socceroos Interview<\/p>\n<p>FIFA World Cup Canada, Mexico, United States 2026\u2122 &#8211; Australia&#8217;s Group D Matches<\/p>\n<p>Australia v T\u00fcrkiye<\/p>\n<p paraid=\"1674673756\" paraeid=\"{00430e50-90ef-42b1-92d7-38105463f2f7}{16}\">Date: Saturday, 13 June\u00a0<br \/>Venue: BC Place, Vancouver, Canada\u00a0<br \/>Kick-off: 9:00pm local \/ 2:00pm AEST (Sunday, 14 June)\u00a0<br \/>Broadcast: SBS and SBS On Demand<\/p>\n<p>USA v Australia<\/p>\n<p paraid=\"1134211995\" paraeid=\"{00430e50-90ef-42b1-92d7-38105463f2f7}{54}\">Date: Friday, 19 June\u00a0<br \/>Venue: Seattle Stadium, Seattle, USA\u00a0<br \/>Kick-off: 12:00pm local \/ 5:00am AEST (Saturday, 20 June)\u00a0<br \/>Broadcast: SBS and SBS On Demand<\/p>\n<p>Paraguay v Australia<\/p>\n<p paraid=\"380800794\" paraeid=\"{00430e50-90ef-42b1-92d7-38105463f2f7}{88}\">Date: Thursday, 25 June\u00a0<br \/>Venue: San Francisco Bay Area Stadium, Santa Clara, USA\u00a0<br \/>Kick-off: 7:00pm local \/ 12:00pm AEST (Friday, 26 June)\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<br \/>Broadcast: SBS and SBS On Demand\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cristian Volpato spoke exclusively to Football Australia after officially being announced in the CommBank Socceroos squad ahead of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":719160,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,348690,171102,217534,952,16135,234681,70067,1000,44,348691,42150,70064],"class_list":["post-719159","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-australia-vs-switzerland","tag-commbank-socceroos","tag-cristian-volpato","tag-featured","tag-fifa-world-cup","tag-fifa-world-cup-2026","tag-international-friendlies-men","tag-interview","tag-news","tag-saturday-6th-june-2026","tag-socceroos","tag-socceroos-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719159","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=719159"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/719159\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/719160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=719159"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=719159"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=719159"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}