Aussies play for respect

’We relish being underdogs’

AUSTRALIA will carry a major chip on their shoulder into their do-or-die clash with Denmark, where victory would raise them into a rare stratosphere of Socceroos success – and give them the respect they demand.

While Australia could yet advance to Round 16 with a draw and a France win against Tunisia, Graham Arnold’s men have adopted a win-orgo-home mentality against the World No.10 Danes as they look to win over a fickle public and doubting rivals.

In the build-up to Australia’s opening game, French players were grilled about what they knew of the Socceroos, and either admitted they couldn’t name a single player or skirted around the topic.

It’s a common theme that feeds into Australia’s underdog mentality – which they’ll again be able to harness on Wednesday, where the Socceroos are 6-1 outsiders.

“Every Australian team in history has been underestimated,” said winger Craig Goodwin, who has starred across Australia’s opening two games with a goal and an assist.

“That will always be the case. For where we are that will always be the case I think in the future, and I think it’s something that I think helps us and something that we will relish, being the underdog.

“Every Australian sporting team relishes that and we’re no different.

“We believe in ourselves and what we’re doing and we will fight to the very end to get the result against Denmark, and try and put our names up in lights and do the nation proud.”

Striker Mitchell Duke is one of the more maligned players in Australia’s starting XI, and is well aware of the social media backlash. It’s what made his breakthrough goal against Tunisia – making him the eighth Socceroo to score a World Cup goal – extra special.

“Trying to encapsulate everything I’ve been through, the struggles, the sacrifices and things like that... I feel like so many people writing me off, maybe questioning (whether) I should be in the starting XI,” Duke said.

“We’ve got a great, prolific scorer in (Jamie) Maclaren sitting on the bench, I’m sure he’s raring to have a chance as well.

“But that’s that competitive nature. We’re mates, but we also want to both play and that helps push the quality in competitiveness.”

Duke backed the team’s ruthless mentality to ensure there would be no complacency heading into the Denmark fixture, regardless of whether a draw would be enough to secure safe passage to the knockout games.