Australia vs Egypt. The land of the pharaohs versus the the land of the fair go. A titanic tussle between two teams who’ve never won a knockout match. In the red corner is Egypt led by Mo Salah, the Egyptian King. In the Green and Gold corner, is the plucky Socceroos led by Jackson Irvine, the hipster Prince of St Pauli, who looks like a barista at a bespoke bakery, who’s only working there to raise money for his next documentary on the history of the fixie bicycle.
Seeing that the game starts in less than 15 hours and I already wasted the whole morning hate-watching Christiano Ronaldo, only to see him score a penalty to help send Portugal through to the next round and certain death against Spain, let’s leap into the Totally Unbiased guide to Australia vs Egypt.
It’s good old fashioned tussle between the tri-colours. Egypt with the red, white and black and Australia and the red white and blue. Egypt have a bird in the middle, and it’s not just any bird, it’s the Eagle of Saladin which symbolises courage and power. And I gotta admit, it looks fucking cool. What do we have? The Union Jack. And what does that stand for? The United Kingdom. A group of nations that have been genuinely rubbish at football for roughly sixty years. For this World Cup, Ireland didn’t make it, Wales didn’t make it, and Scotland just made it, but crashed out of the group1 (although Scottish fans won’t remember, because they drank a Loch Ness worth of liquor and were last seen floating on a booze cruise somewhere in Boston Harbour). England made it, but hasn’t won a World Cup since 1966. Although that doesn’t stop them swaggering into the World Cup every four years like Boba Fett in Star Wars, but then just like Boba Fett, going out in the most absurd manner.
We shouldn’t be shit scared. We should be moderately concerned. Egypt are okay, but like us they only won one game in the group matches and that was against New Zealand which was 3-1. You know who else beat New Zealand 3-1? Australia in 2025. And this was 2025 BC (before Cristian Volpato).
If (and that’s a bloody big if) Mo Salah plays, it could be Mo Salah, Mo Problemsfor Australia.2 3 The former Liverpool star has won the three Golden boots, two English titles and the Champions League. But you know what he hasn’t won? A World Cup knockout stage. Winning a World Cup knockout stage is the final infinity stone for Mo Salah4, but what happened when Thanos tried to get all the Infinity Stones? He ended up badly injured5, which is where Mo Salah finds himself.
Since Salah limped off the ground against Iran and strapped a bag of ice to his hamstring, I’ve been hitting refresh on the google search, “Mo Salah Injury News” every few minutes. Right now, I know more about Mo Salah’s hamstring than I do about any single part of my own body.
For the first few days, it seemed like he was in big trouble, but yesterday the Egyptian social media team posted a picture of him with the caption, “The King is Back.” This doesn’t bode well for Australia, but seriously, when the last time you trusted a social media manager? Years ago I met a bloke who did Ssocial media for The Labor Party at friend’s birthday, and he was the single most obnoxious person I’ve ever met. He also didn’t pay for his round. So I gotta call bullshit on this post.
The good news is when Mo Salah went off against Iran, it became No Salah, No Problems for Iran. Well there was one problem, and that was a dodgy VAR call which robbed Iran of a goal, and robbed Australia of the ultimate grudge match rematch against Iran, and our chance to get revenge for the night which shall not be named at the MCG in 1997.
Well, there is Omar Marmoush, a player straight off the Manchester City Death Star, who usually plays as back-up striker for Erling Haaland, when Haaland gets tired of steam rolling small defenders, and has to put his viking boots up for a match.
But for Egypt there’s none of this understudy to the cyborg viking bullshit for Marmoush. Next to Salah he’s a very potent attacking force, who will become the main striker, if the Egyptian social media manager turns out to be having a lend.
No.
No, they shouldn’t.
Use that term again and I’m leaving faster than Roy Keane in the 2002 World Cup.
We have Harry Souttar and Lucas Herrington, who started together for the first time in the last match and looked like they had played together since they were kids. They’re both bloody tall drinks of water6, with Souttar standing 1.98 metres and Herrington hitting a height of 1.93 metres. You could say they’re like our twin towers.
Okay forget the twin towers thing. Souttar is a Scottish giant who turns up to save us whenever we’re in trouble. So he’s basically Hagrid. Which I guess makes Herrington, Cedric Diggory, the tall athletic hunk from Hufflepuff (before he becomes embittered and turns toward the dark arts) who arrives quite late in the Harry Potter series, and everyone immediately loves him for being a great bloke.
No, I’m just leaving the door open to become a right wing/shock jock grifter, in case the moderately amusing sports commentary doesn’t work out. It’s called doing a Hughesy. And seriously, have you heard about these changes to negative gearing…
Being scared of IRANKUNDA! goes without saying (although Popovich will have to find a better way to use him than as a lone central striker like he did against Paraguay. To quote this bloke who has become one of my favourite things on social media during the World Cup, “Popovich what are you doing Bruv?”)
But here’s something else they should be scared of: Cristian Volpato and Jordan Bos. They played on the same side together for the first time against Paraguay, and looked like soulmates who finally found each other. This was John Coltrane meeting Miles Davis, Ginger Rogers first dance with Fred Astaire, and Big Boi and Andre 3000 rapping together for the first time.
To take the Outkast analogy and run with it, watching them play together was like hearing Big Boi and Andre 3000 on Outkast’s first single, “Players Ball”. It was the bold arrival of two very different stars, with very different styles, tethered by a cosmic connection, who are pointed toward the sky and about to launch into the stratosphere. And just like the greatest Outkast songs, these two elevate each other, and the game, and we have only seen the smallest hint of what they can achieve.
Australia 2-0.
See you at the Player’s Ball.
Now I’m here to tell you there’s a better day
When the player’s ball is happenin’, all day everyday.
I initally wrote that Scotland lost all three matches, but I was wrong. Thanks to Jamie McGeechan for setting me straight.
If anyone noticed the “Mo Salah, Mo Problems” joke (let’s call it a joke) on SBS’s Cup Fever, I didn’t steal it. I actually wrote it, and when it got a big laugh, I was immediately annoyed I hadn’t kept it for myself. So the only person I’ve plagiarised, is myself, but for the greater good of sharing it with you.
If anyone comes up with a really good photoshop/AI image of the Mo Money, Mo Problems record cover with a picture of Mo Salah, you can have a free lifetime subscription (for the next six months).
Mo Salah also hasn’t won an African Cup of Nations, but the infinity stone analogy didn’t flow as well when I tried to say he was missing two infinity stones.
Please don’t come at me Marvel nerds. I only half watched Avengers endgame with my nine year old during the lockdowns and could barely understand what was going on. In my defence I was distracted by trying to troll Joe Hildebrand on social media at the same time.
“Tall Drink of Water” was the term my Dad gave to every opposition ruckman who was taller than me in junior football. On his metric scale, the onyl thing bigger than a tall drink of water was a “Bloody Big Unit”
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