Newcastle’s incoming wonderkid, Garang Kuol came off the bench for Australia in their 4-1 defeat to World Cup champions, France yesterday.
It was a pretty thankless task for the 18-year-old who became the ninth youngest player to appear in the World Cup Finals with Australia already pretty much dead and buried by the time he came onto the pitch.
Australia took an early lead against the defending champions, but from then on out it was pretty much all France, although Australia did have a long-range effort drift narrowly wide and they hit the post, but that was as close as they came as France ran rampant.
With just a 15-minute cameo in a game that was already out of sight, Newcastle fans didn’t get much of a look at their new signing, but the fact that he came on while chasing the game bodes well that he will be called upon again in the Socceroos remaining group games.
After the game, The Athletic caught up with Garang Kuol who spoke about joining Newcastle saying “I’ve been reading a lot of messages, a lot of support, people saying “Welcome to the Toon” and stuff. I’ll just send them a photo of these shoes!” Alongside an image of Kuol sporting a pair of black and white Nike trainers. The lad knows what he’s doing.
Australia forward Garang Kuol to @TheAthleticFC on joining Newcastle:
“I’ve been reading a lot of messages, a lot of support, people saying “Welcome to the Toon” and stuff. I’ll just send them a photo of these shoes!”https://t.co/E1adIoMpRR#FIFAWorldCup #Qatar2022 #AUS #NUFC pic.twitter.com/APsGcqsQWP
— David Ornstein (@David_Ornstein) November 23, 2022
Australia play Tunisia on Saturday morning at 10am. Hopefully we’ll see more of Kuol in that game to whet our appetites before he officially becomes a Newcastle player in January.