By Mark Baber
July 16- Football Federation Australia (FFA) has confirmed the Socceroos will be playing Belgium, Qatar and UAE as part of their preparations for the 2015 Asian Cup which they will be hosting from 9 to 31 January 2015.
The game against World Cup quarter-finalists Belgium will be away on September 4. Australia play UAE on October 10 and Qatar on October 14, with venues as yet unconfirmed but in the Middle East.
The FFA confirmed it is also in negotiations to play a second European team during September and two matches in Australia in November.
The Australians were heavily defeated in the voting to host the 2022 World Cup and the FFA has recently said it has been “heavily involved” in investigating claims of corruption in Qatar’s successful bid, lending the impending clash a little spice.
Current coach Ange Postecoglou said, “We have confirmed three opponents and hope to have three more games between now and the 2015 AFC Asian Cup, which gives us good preparation for what will be a challenging tournament on Australian soil in January,”
“Belgium will give us a good post-World Cup indication of how we are progressing and then we will get some good hit outs against Asian opposition to help us prepare tactically for the Asian Cup.”
Asian sides did not perform well at the World Cup, with Australia losing all their games and Japan, South Korea and Iran finishing bottom of their groups whilst failing to win a single game between them. Nevertheless, the Asian Cup promises to be more interesting than ever, with interesting clashes between West and East Asian nations, and the presence of China and Palestine and the desire of the World Cup participants for some redemption meaning interest could be higher than in previous editions of the tournament.
Both Qatar and UAE have qualified for the tournament and the friendlies will be good preparation for them. The tournament participants will also include North and South Korea, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Uzbekistan, Iran, Kuwait, Jordan and Iraq. The winner of the tournament will earn the right to compete for the 2017 FIFA Confederations Cup hosted by Russia.