Subway Olyroos’ squad for Saudi Arabian friendlies confirmed | Football Australia

The Subway Olyroos will face Saudi Arabia and Qatar, as their preparation for the AFC U23 Asian Cup™ Qatar 2024 begin to intensify.

The fixtures – scheduled for Friday, 17 November (Qatar) and Tuesday, 21 November (Saudi Arabia) – will be played at Prince Saud Bin Jalawi Stadium, providing Vidmar’s squad with the invaluable opportunity to spend time together as a group while facing quality opposition.

Subway Olyroos’ Head Coach, Tony Vidmar said this is the beginning of an important period within the U-23 program.

“There’s been some really positive results in recent camps at the Maurice Rovello Tournament and in securing qualification for the U-23 Asian Cup,” Vidmar said.

“Those are important for the confidence and belief within this group, as we build towards a phase of competition that is significant within our program.

“We’ve spoken about what success at an Asian Cup and in turn, Olympic qualification looks like for the players individually and as a collective – there's real excitement as 2024 approaches.”

Vidmar added that these upcoming friendlies offered a variety of benefits to his wider squad.

“We’ve secured games against teams who will provide a different challenge to those we’ve recently faced, in very similar conditions to what we’ll see in Doha next year – in terms of acclimatising the squad it ticks several boxes,” Vidmar said.

“There are four available matches to prepare ahead of our first Asian Cup group game, so every part of our preparation needs to be geared towards that, ensuring we can be at our best and effectively execute our plans on the pitch.”

Vidmar’s squad features several returning faces from the team that successfully secured AFC U-23 Asian Cup™ Qatar 2024 qualification, including Calem