World Footy News

At the Australian team’s training session in Melbourne on Friday three players separated off from the rest for some goalkeeping practice. With assistant coach Jason Mifsud and Melbourne Victory’s goalkeeping coach Steve Mautone  giving instructions on positioning and tactics Ash McGrath, Nathan Lovett-Murray and Cameron Ellis-Yolmen.

They each took turns in goal while the other two came in and took running shots. None of the three really stood out and plenty of balls went in the net. Ellis-Yolmen appeared to probably have the best form to my eyes but not much split the three of them. It was the first session and clearly there would be a few more sessions before the first match tomorrow against the Dublin Universities team that defeated the VAFA team last week.

I would suspect that Ash McGrath will probably get the job first up as it is probably a bit much for the youngster Ellis-Yolmen to take on the important job in front of the big Irish crowds.  But Lovett-Murray may also get the call up if things do not go well in the warm up match.

Unless there is some rapid improvement though, the keeper position could be the Achilles heel of the Australians that the Irish would look to exploit and take the opportunities to score plenty of goals in the net.

Alternatively the main Australian squad looked quick and skilled and if they can couple this with high paced tackling pressure they may surprise the Irish with their own pressure on the Irish defence. Some of the one two combo goal scoring work was very impressive.