Goalkeeper Mat Ryan says Socceroos can take pride from Chile loss but must learn from mistakes

Goalkeeper Mat Ryan, unable to keep out the shots from Alexis Sanchez and Jorge Valdívia that established Chile’s bridgehead early on, said the team could “take pride” from the resilience shown in fighting back, and coming within inches of the equaliser before Chile secured a late and decisive third.

Lamenting that the Socceroos “only had ourselves to blame” for the chaotic opening, Ryan insisted it was still a “good learning curve” for the young team.

“We can take pride from our performance after the first 15 minutes – to begin with we showed them too much respect early on and allowed them to play,” he said.

“They caused us problems and took their chances. It just didn’t go to plan, letting them dictate things.

“It was only after the second goal that we woke up and took it to them, went back to our game plan. Once we got one back it became a real dogfight I felt and we were really unfortunate to concede at the end.

“There were a couple of decisions by the referee that didn’t help, a few fouls he gave against us but he’s trying to do the best he can, and at the end of the day we’ve only got ourselves to blame. You can’t allow an opposition like that so much space, we started so slow and we couldn’t claw it back in the end.”

Asked if the enormity of the occasion had led to stage fright, Ryan said it stemmed more from being too aware of the dangers posed by the South American side.

“I don’t think it was nerves, just too much respect,” he said.

“It’s hard to put your finger on it so soon after the game but we’ll go back and review the tape, assess what we can do better and take the positives out of it. We’ve had a taste of it, we know what the level is and we know how tough the next game will be.

“But it’s a good learning curve. We hung in there and fought back really well. I thought we were unlucky not to get back on level terms at some point in the second half. Then they got a bit of luck in that I pulled off a save, (Jean Beausejour) gets a rebound and finds the bottom corner. But it’s a results based game.”

source: couriermail.com.au