Fort Towson

The 2006 FIFA World Cup CONMEBOL–OFC qualification play-off was a two-legged home-and-away tie between the winners of the Oceania qualifying tournament, Australia, and the fifth-placed team from the South American qualifying tournament, Uruguay.

After winning the series, Australia qualified for the 2006 FIFA World Cup held in Germany.[3][4]

Match update

John Aloisi taking the decisive penalty

The games were played on 12 and 16 November 2005 in Montevideo and Sydney respectively. With the home team winning 1–0 in both matches, the aggregate score was tied 1–1, and, with no away goal advantage, the play-off was decided by a penalty shoot-out, which Australia won 4–2 in order to qualify for the FIFA World Cup for the first time since the 1974 tournament.[5][6]

It was the second consecutive FIFA World Cup where the two sides had played each other for a place in the tournament. On the first occasion in 2001, Uruguay won 3–1 on aggregate. The draw for determining the order of the home and away legs was made at a FIFA congress on 10 September 2005.[7] Australia finally won a FIFA World Cup play-off after losing to Scotland (1986), Argentina (1994), Iran (1998) and the own Uruguay (2002).

In the second leg, there was heavy booing by Australian fans during Uruguay's national anthem, in response to the dirty tricks, spitting and punches thrown at the Australian team on their previous playoff meeting.[8]

Venues

Estadio Centenario (left) and Telstra Stadium, venues for the series

Background

Uruguay Round Australia
Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts
 Brazil 18 9 7 2 35 17 18 34
 Argentina 18 10 4 4 29 17 12 34
 Ecuador 18 8 4 6 23 19 4 28
 Paraguay 18 8 4 6 23 23 0 28
 Uruguay 18 6 7 5 23 28 −5 25
Final standings
Team Pld W D L GF GA GD Pts
 Australia 5 4 1 0 21 3 18 13
 Solomon Islands 5 3 1 1 9 6 3 10
 New Zealand 5 3 0 2 17 5 12 9
 Fiji 5 1 1 3 3 10 −7 4
 Tahiti 5 1 1 3 2 24 −22 4
 Vanuatu 5 1 0 4 5 9 −4 3
Final round
(OFC) 		Opponent Result
1st leg  Solomon Islands (H) 7–0
2nd leg  Solomon Islands (A) 2–1

Match details

First leg

First leg
Uruguay 1–0 Australia
D. Rodríguez 37' Report
Attendance: 55,000

OFFICIALS

MATCH RULES

Second leg

Second leg
Australia 1–0 (a.e.t.) Uruguay
Bresciano 35' Report
Penalties
Kewell soccer ball with check mark
Neill soccer ball with check mark
Vidmar soccer ball with check mark
Viduka soccer ball with red X
Aloisi soccer ball with check mark		 4–2 soccer ball with red X D. Rodríguez
soccer ball with check mark Varela
soccer ball with check mark Estoyanoff
soccer ball with red X Zalayeta
Attendance: 82,698

OFFICIALS

MATCH RULES

  • 90 minutes
  • 30 minutes of extra-time if necessary
  • Penalty shoot-out if scores still level:
  • 3 (of 7) substitutions permitted

Aftermath

Australia qualified for the 2006 FIFA World Cup Finals in Germany and were drawn into Group F with defending champions Brazil, Croatia and Japan. After beating Japan 3–1 in their opening match, Australia lost 2–0 to Brazil and in the final match they also drew 2–2 with Croatia, finishing second in the group on four points. In the Round of 16, Australia were defeated 1–0 by the eventual champions, Italy.

For Uruguay it was the third FIFA World Cup out of four since 1990 they failed to qualify. Jorge Fossati lost his job and rehired Óscar Tabárez who managed the team before (1988–1990), and Uruguay entered the Proceso era breaking many records and have qualified for every FIFA World Cup since 2010.

In 2009, Australian Broadcasting Corporation ranked Australia's victory in 2005 as number one on their list of milestone sporting moments of the 2000s.[9] Melbourne paper the Herald Sun named Australia's victory in 2005 as one of 100 great moments in Australian sports history.[10]

A documentary titled November 16 was released in 2015 to commemorate the 10th anniversary of the second leg. It featured interviews with Álvaro Recoba, Fabián Carini and members of the Australian squad.[11]

References

  1. ^ "History for Carrasco Intl. Airport, Uruguay". wunderground.com. 12 November 2005. Retrieved 1 May 2013.
  2. ^ "History for Kingsford Smith Intl. Airport, Australia". wunderground.com. 16 November 2005. Retrieved 1 May 2013.
  3. ^ "Australia derribó a Uruguay y clasificó a la Copa del Mundo 2006". Al Aire Libre, 16 November 2005
  4. ^ "Uruguay se quedó sin Mundial". Infobae, 16 November 2005
  5. ^ "Flashback - Australia v Uruguay: 2005 FIFA World Cup Intercontinental Play-off". the-afc. Asian Football Confederation. 14 November 2017. Retrieved 25 May 2023.
  6. ^ "History of the Australian Socceroos at the World Cup". Topend Sports. Retrieved 25 May 2023.
  7. ^ "Intercontinental play-off schedule confirmed". FIFA. 10 September 2005. Archived from the original on 22 January 2013.
  8. ^ "Socceroos reveal dirty tricks inspired win". ABC News. 18 November 2005.
  9. ^ "ABC Grandstand Sport - A decade in sport: 10 milestone moments". Australian Broadcasting Corporation.
  10. ^ "100 'proud to be Aussie' sports moments". Herald Sun. 24 January 2015.
  11. ^ "Socceroos documentary reminds us of how far we've come but there's still a long way to go". 22 November 2015.

source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2006_FIFA_World_Cup_qualification_(CONMEBOL%E2%80%93OFC_play-off)