Harry Kewell has kept Australia’s World Cup dream alive scoring an equaliser with 11 minutes left on the clock versus Croatia to advance Australia to the next round of the Soccer World Cup and a meeting with Italy.

The superb gladiator fought game was largely overshadowed by many bad refereeing decisions from Graham Poll going against both teams, meaning that a draw seemed the only fair conclusion. The Croatians put on a valiant show never giving up and having several shots in the closing minutes to almost snatch a victory - but it wasn’t to be.

Croatia scored first, in just the 2nd minute of the game through Darijo Srna. Australia drew level from a Craig Moore penalty kick in the 38th minute after Stjepan Tomas handled a cross inside the area. Then one of the most controversial moments of the game occurred. Niko Kovac fired a lazy shot at the Australian goal which should have been a regulation save for Australian goalie Kalac, but he fumbled the ball and it rolled over his body and into the goal sending Croatia into the lead 2 - 1 in the 56th minute.

From here the Australian’s lifted having many more opportunities at goal and spending almost the entire 30-odd minutes in the Croatian half. Kewell was in his element firing a deadly point blank shot at Pletikosa who made a reflex save to keep his team ahead. Pletikosa made another sensational save again from a Harry Kewell strike, holding onto the ball and keeping it just centimetres from the goal line while 2 Australians going for the ball fell on top of him.

In the 79th minute John Aloisi flicked on a cross with his head to Kewell who trapped the ball then swerved the kick around a Croatian defender and into the goal to score the equalizer for Australia.

At this point the game became farcical. The referee first sent off Kovac after he received his second yellow card. Australia’s Brett Emerton then made a silly error and was yellow carded (his second in 2 games meaning he would miss the game against Italy) and eventually was given a second yellow card for an accidental handball, was then given a red and sent off. The referee however failed to realise he had already given Croatia’s Josip Simunic 2 yellow cards, and gave him a 3rd yellow card before eventually pulling out the red and sending him off.

There were many penalties missed by the referee, two of them very blatant (one of the Croatian’s punched the ball out of the goal square to save a certain goal for his side and it was missed totally by the referee) and this soured the game somewhat. However the referee was equally bad to both sides and so no team gained an advantage from the poor refereeing decisions.

Even though the game ended in a draw, Australia now advances to the round of 16 having 1 win 1 draw 1 loss to finish 2nd in their pool behind Brazil, whilst Croatia is out of the competition with 0 wins 2 draws and 1 loss.

Goals:
2. SRNA Darijo (2′) - Croatia
3. MOORE Craig (38′ PEN) - Australia
10. KOVAC Niko (56′) - Croatia
10. KEWELL Harry (79′) - Australia

Australia have beaten Japan 3 - 1 in their opening World Cup Soccer match, with some last minute brilliance to devastate Japan who fell asleep late in the second half thinking they had the game won with a 1 - NIL lead. However, Australia saved their best till last goaling 3 times in the final 8 minutes of the game to beat the hapless Japan team 3 - 1.

Japan scored controversially early, when one of their strikers pushed the Australian goalie, Mark Schwarzer out of the way in a blatant professional foul that was unspotted by the referee. The Australian’s looked demoralised, but continued to fight on and create scoring opportunities taking numerous shots at goal in both halves, but were unable to find the back of the net.

Australia still dominated throughout the match, firing many more shots at the goal than Japan, who showed rare glimpses of skill but were outplayed in all facets of the game by the brilliant Socceroos. It looked like Japan would hold on for the victory, however in an inspired passage of play, the Australian coach, Guus Hiddink sent soccer wonderboy Tim Cahill (pictured) onto the paddock, and he didn’t dissapoint, threading the ball through half a dozen legs to score Australia’s first goal, and then firing a torpedo from the back of the pack to get his, and Australia’s second.

In a blaze of glory the Australian’s attacked once more saving their best for the final few minutes, as John Aloisi put the icing on a very big chocolate cake with Australia’s 3rd goal, smashing Japan into oblivion where they belong.

Bring on Brazil!