Match Preview
Australia will be present at a fifth successive World Cup Tournament and will be hoping to build on the last 16 appearance they achieved at the 2022 World Cup.
Australia made qualification look routine when they came through 3rd Round Qualifying behind Japan with a record of Five wins, four draws and a solitary defeat to Bahrain.
The Socceroos will be confident of making it out of Group D with USA and a Paraguay side who looked out of their depth also in this group.
They head into the Opening fixture having suffered a 1-0 defeat to Mexico and a 1-1 draw with Swiitzerland on May 6th.
The sides have met on two previous occasions and Australia are still looking for a positive result having lost both games.
Turkey will be heading to a third World Cup but this will be their first since that memorable summer of 2002 when they shocked everyone by making it all the way to the semi-finals.
The Turkish league is fast becoming one of Euope’s best and that is shown in the improvement in the International team, they made it to the quarter finals of Euro 24 and they are currently on an eight match unbeaten run.
Italian Vincenzo Montella is in charge of “The Crescent Stars” and he has guided his team to seven wins from the past eight games including beating North Macedonia 4-0 and Venezuela 2-1 in warm up fixtures.
They may have had to come through the Play-Offs with wins over Romania & Kosovo but no team will want to face this talented Turkish side.
Team News Australia
Australian manager Tony Popovic may no longer have big names stars such as Harry Kewell & Mark Viduka to call upon but he does have a squad full of players from Europe’s top leagues.
There are no significant injury worries for Popovic ahead of this opening game so he is likely to stick to his tried and tested starting 11 featuring familiar names such as former Brighton goalkeeper Matt Ryan, Jackson Irvine of St Pauli and the evergreen Mathew Leckie who will win his 81st Cap against Turkey.
Norwich City striker Mohamed Toure had a fantastic second half of the season at Carrow Road scoring 9 goals in 11 games and he looks the likely started in attack for the Socceroos hoping to add to his 2 International goals to date.
Team News Turkiye
Vincenzo Montella does have a major injury worry however with Juventus winger Kenan Yildiz rated as a major doubt to face the socceroos due to a calf injury that has plauged him in recent weeks.
Real Madrid star Arda Guler however has fully recovered from the injury he was carrying towards the end of the La Liga season and many experts expect him to be a star of this world cup.
Montella has struggled to find his natural number 9 but it looks like Deniz Gul will get the nod to start along with Baris Yilmaz and Kokcu Orkun in attack.
Captain Hakan Calhanoglu will feature in the middle of the Turkey midfield.
Form
| Team | Latest Result | Form (Last 6) |
|---|---|---|
| Australia | 1-1 vs Switzerland | L L W W L D |
| Turkey | 2-1 vs Venezuela | W D W W W W |
Possible Line Ups
Ryan; Italiano, Circati, Souttar, Herrington, Bos; Metcalfe, Irvine, O’Neill, Leckie; Toure
Turkiye (4-1-4-1)
Cakir; Celik, Demiral, Bardakci, Elmali; Calhanoglu, Yuksek; Guler, Kokcu, Yilmaz; Gul
Betting Odds
| Team | Odds | Bookmaker |
|---|---|---|
| Australia Win | 9/2 (5.50) | Grand Ivy |
| Draw | 29/10 (3.90) | Dream Vegas |
| Turkiye Win | 3/4 (1.75) | 247Bet |
We Predict.....
Australia 1-2 Turkiye
This should be one of the most competitive games of the first round of matches but we just feel the extra class in the Turkiye team will edge them to the victory.