Team profile: Australia

Tim Cahill, the New York Red Bulls midfielder, is likely to be playing in his last World Cup. Even though at 34 he lacks the agility and speed of younger team members, he retains significant aerial ability, still excels at clinical shooting and is seen as the team’s biggest attacking threat. Cahill, who will be making his 68th international appearance — this is his third World Cup — likes a physical battle and is Australia’s all-time leading scorer, with 31 goals in 67 games. Given the team’s record, look to Cahill, the captain, to push his mates for anything resembling a positive result.

While losing 6–1 and 3–1 to North Korea in the qualifying rounds for the 1966 tournament may count for points, Cahill offers the upside. In 2006, he scored the Socceroos’ first-ever goal at a World Cup. Then, four minutes later, he netted again and boom! Australia went on to beat Japan 3–1. Socceroo fans cherish the moment even more than Cahill’s scoring for a 2–1 win over Serbia in South Africa in 2010.

Australia, in Group B with Spain, the Netherlands and Chile, won’t progress past the group stage. Coach Ange Postecoglou, hired to replace German import Holger Osieck late last year after consecutive 6–0 losses to Brazil and France, signed a five-year contract. Clearly, homegrown Postecoglou is playing a long game. If the team avoids embarrassing itself in Brazil, count that as a win.

Or as Cahill said, “I just ask the fans to stand by us and believe in us and the young kids because we’re flying the flag for our country and waiting for the next biggest moment in Australian football.”

So throw another shrimp on the barbie, sip a ’94 Leeuwin Estate 2010 Art Series Chardonnay (Margaret River) through a Flexi-straw and dream of World Cups to come.

They win! Or at least stagger up and out of the group stage.

In a 2002 World Cup qualifier game, Australia kangaroo-kicked American Samoa 31–0, still the most lopsided score in a FIFA-sanctioned international match. The American Samoa team's comeback from that loss to eventually win its first game in international competition became the subject of a documentary, "Next Goal Wins."