Narrow win for Young Socceroos

Going into the tournament, Young Socceroos coach Paul Okon was forced to make two changes to his squad with Luke O'Dea coming in for the injured Adam Taggart and David Vrankovic replacing Curtis Good.

Terry Antonis was given the honour of captaining Australia for the first time.

The Young Socceroos dominated possession for the opening 15 minutes and created a couple of opportunities but were unable to convert.

Midway through the half Ben Garuccio made a run down the left, and crossed into the box for Anthony Proia who was unable to finish cleanly.

Indonesia began to get more possession as the match progressed and was dangerous on the break. It forced Australia defenders to work hard and forced goal keeper Nick Munro into making a couple of great saves.

Deep into stoppage time at the end of the first half, a corner from Garrucio was put to the far post, which was met perfectly by Proia who headed home.

The second half was a hard slog for both teams as the heat and humidity took its toll.

The hosts put a lot of pressure on in the final 15 minutes with a number of dangerous shots on goal, but some great defending and goalkeeping from Munro allowed the Young Socceroos to hold on for an important opening win.

"It was a great performance in difficult conditions against a good opponent in front of a huge home crowd. It was also a fantastic experience for our players to play in front a parochial full stadium," Okon said.

"The players played some very good football and we probably could have got a few more goals. The Indonesian team are a very good team and we were playing against players two to three years older.

"We now turn our focus to the next game and are looking to build on this result and put in another solid performance."

Australia line-up: 18.Nick MUNRO (gk), 2.Josh BRILLANTE, 3.Connor CHAPMAN, 5.Corey BROWN, 6.Reece CAIRA (21.Brandon O’NEILL 85’), 8.Jake BARKER-DAISH, 10.Terry ANTONIS (c), 11.Jesse MAKAROUNAS, 14.Anthony PROIA (43.Luke O’DEA 72’), 16.Giancarlo GALLIFUOCO (13.Daniel PETKOVSKI 81’), 42.Ben GARUCCIO.

In the other matches, Japan beat Macau 6-0 and Singapore defeated Timor Leste 2-1.

Australia's next match is against Macau on Saturday 7 July before it faces Singapore (10 July), Timor Leste (12 July) and Japan (15 July).

The top two teams from Group E and the best third placed team of all groups (total 15) will then progress to the AFC U-22 Championship, to be played in January 2014.