Melbourne Heart FC’s trio of David Vrankovic, Jeremy Walker and Benjamin Garuccio have been named in Head Coach Paul Okon’s 24-player squad for a training camp on the Central Coast from 21 to 25 April 2013.
Melbourne Heart FC’s trio of David Vrankovic, Jeremy Walker and Benjamin Garuccio have been named in Head Coach Paul Okon’s 24-player squad for a Qantas Young Socceroos training camp on the Central Coast from 21 to 25 April 2013.
Vrankovic and Garuccio have had previous experience with the Young Socceroos, while for Tasmanian Jeremy Walker, it represents his first call-up to underage national duty.
“It-s a dream come true, I didn-t think it would happen,” Walker told melbourneheartfc.com.au.
“I-ve missed out on a lot of camps previously, under-17s and under-19s, but I-ve put in a lot of hard work and hopefully I get another couple more [call-ups].”
Garuccio and Vrankovic featured in Okon’s 23-man Young Socceroos squad for the under-19 Asian Championships held in the United Arab Emirates last November.
“It-s great, it-s an honour to be called up to the national team so I-m looking forward to it,” Garuccio said.
“It-s going to be very tough; a lot of competition out there, a lot of players that have really broken through in the A-League this year so it-s going to be interesting to see what type of talent is there.”
Okon will be using this training camp, consisting of purely Australian-based players, as the first part of his final selection phase for the upcoming FIFA U-20 World Cup Turkey 2013.
“This is our first camp together since the AFC U-19 Championships last November and our first since the draw for the World Cup was made last month,” Okon said.
“There are some new faces in this squad that we will have the opportunity to experience the national team set-up for the first time as well.
“The competition for places in the final World Cup squad we be high and we need the players to show themselves in these camps.”
Walker, Garuccio and Vrankovic will train with Heart tomorrow, before attending the first day of the camp on Sunday.
