‘Something’s changed’: Why Socceroos’ confidence has gone through the roof

If you watched the Socceroos play Brazil on Friday night, you probably noticed it. Tony Popovic can see it in the way his players now carry themselves. Alessandro Circati can feel it coursing through his veins.

“For sure, something’s changed,” he said.

There is a swagger about this team that wasn’t there before, an intangible growth spurt that can only be triggered by experience: of knowing what it feels like to play at a World Cup, realising that you belong on that grand stage, climbing the ladder at club level and realising it again.

Circati is one of the 11 players who parlayed their World Cup campaign into career advancement at club level, transferring from Parma to Portuguese giants Benfica for $33 million.

He remembers being on holiday and driving back from the beach when he got the call to tell him that he might have to start thinking about moving his life to Lisbon. Now at one of the world’s biggest clubs, he broke through for his starting debut last month in a 2-0 UEFA Europa League victory away to AC Milan.

His family all support the Rossoneri, and his uncle wore a Milan scarf and a Benfica jersey to the match.

It was a “dream come true”, Circati said – but dreams like these have quickly become part of a new reality for Circati and many of his Socceroos teammates.

“When you make a move, the positive or the negative, you always change. You grow,” he said.

“Personally, for Nestor [Irankunda], Lucas [Herrington], Patty [Beach] … we’ve all gone to bigger clubs. You’re a bit more confident, you’re playing at a higher level, you’re training at a higher level, so it’s normal that you develop.”

What Popovic now wants to see when these players gather to represent their country every few months is for that confidence to manifest on the pitch.

That is what happened in Townsville. Instead of sitting deep and deferring to their glamorous opponents, they seized the initiative. They played through Brazil’s press, they showed bravery in their pass selection, and but for a last-minute header they conceded with the final play of the match, they would have had a famous result to show for it.

Many have pigeonholed Popovic as a conservative, bus-parking tactician, but this is the kind of direction he wants to take the Socceroos – and perhaps only now do they have the belief in themselves to execute.

“In the days leading up to the game, the boss did specify what he wanted from us, and we had to put that on show,” Circati said.

“It all starts from him, and then we’ve got to sort of be able to showcase that we can do what he asks. He wanted us to play out a little bit more, be a bit more brave, break in their press, and maybe risking a pass more … essentially it’s maybe risking the few per cent, not playing the pass that you know 100 per cent is going to arrive to your teammate.

“Maybe that’s the horizontal or back one, maybe risking the pass forward where your team-mate’s got the man behind him or to the side of him, or simply going one-v-one with an attacker or just simple things like this, which from the outside doesn’t seem like a big risk, but from the inside, it’s the difference between keeping the ball or losing the ball, which essentially can lead to scoring or conceding.”

Ideally, that experience against Brazil will have a compounding effect. Having just measured up against the five-time world champions, and left knowing they were good enough to beat them, they should feel even more emboldened about who they are, and where they can go as a team.

And so, when they face Brazil again on Tuesday night at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, there will be no reason why they should think about backing down.

“I feel like I’m built for these situations,” said striker Tete Yengi, whose hold-up play was an underappreciated highlight of the 1-1 draw.

“We have a lot of confidence in ourselves as a group. We have a lot of players playing at top levels now … week in, week out, you’re going against top players. That naturally builds confidence and belief in yourself that you can go out there and do any game.

“We’re physically one of the best, I feel like. And technically also, we’re getting so much better. So if we compete on both of those levels, then yeah: why not?”