Former Socceroos captain Paul Okon says the form of Awer Mabil and Chris Ikonomidis can be classed as shining lights from an otherwise frustrating 2019 Asian Cup campaign.
Australia entered the tournament as defending champions, but were eliminated in the quarterfinals by host nation UAE, 1-0.
However, Okon thinks the play of two of the Socceroos’ youngest players will go down as a positive.
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“The two that spring to mind are Awer Mabil and Chris Ikonomidis,” Okon told SEN Afternoons.
“Both boys I think have been a shining light and hopefully this experience of an international tournament will give them something for the future.”
From a team perspective, Okon believes Australia’s campaign could be classified as a failure.
“Failure if you’re looking at it from a point of view of results,” he said.
“The fact that we were the holders and Graham Arnold spoke about expecting to win every game and win the tournament, yeah, I would say it is a failure.”