Melbourne Heart assistant coach Jesper Olsen believes the Danish national team has some work to do in the next nine days before the World Cup kicks off.
Denmark lost 1-0 to Australia in a friendly in Roodepoort, Johannesburg last night Australian time and Olsen, who was a member of Denmark's 1986 World Cup squad, believes there is major need for improvement before their opening group stage match against Holland on June 14.
"For the players themselves, it is just a training match and it is not something that is that important so maybe sometimes when we watch it, we are probably more critical than the coaches who just want to see their players having another 90 minutes," Olsen said as a guest commentator on Fox Sports "The first game is what you are working towards and this was not a great game at all. There was a lot of stuff there that can be done better and they all know that."
From an Australian perspective, Olsen believes that Pim Verbeek has some good attacking options that he must try to create a more flowing brand of football after playing stagnantly at times.
"I think the way for Australia is that you need Joshua Kennedy who is one of those players that you need crosses from either side to him to use his height and that's an important part of your game and a lot of times today Australia played quite narrow," he said.
"I think that's something that they will probably be working on. Luke Wilshire, when he comes forward, is a great crosser of the ball and seems to find Josh's head quite regularly so I think that's a weapon to have as well.
"We haven't spoken much about Nikita Rukavytsya. I think he's probably one of your young guns who has the speed to be a different weapon because he is so fast and he has good control of the ball. So you have some options there and when you see the introduction today of (Brett) Holman and Dario Vidosic, there was a bit more speed in the game and these are things you have been looking for. There are some options and they will probably be tried in the next game as well."
