Australia head coach Ange Postecoglou has confirmed he will not be selecting Lucas Neill for the World Cup.
The 36 year-old, who has been capped 96 times by the Socceroos, ended the season on loan at Doncaster Rovers from Watford in a bid to try and prove his fitness, but Postecoglou has informed Neill that he will not be heading to Brazil as a part of his 23 man squad.
“He was obviously very disappointed,” he said, as reported by The Guardian. “It was difficult. He has worked damn hard to try and get himself ready and available. He has shown an enormous determination to go to this World Cup.
“I just had to make a decision not so much about the recent history, but the last six months. In terms of form and fitness, there just wasn’t enough evidence there for me to say that he would be able to hold up in the World Cup.
“He was probably a little bit unlucky in a couple of the moves he made. And certainly from my perspective, if post-Christmas, from January onwards, if he’d had four months of football under his belt, I guess a different decision would have been made.
“It’s not easy. He has shown outstanding determination and it’s a credit to him. You can see why he has played for his country as many times as he has and why he was a leader. He has certainly gone down fighting.”
Neill played for Australia at both the 2006 and 2010 World Cup’s.
