Aussies are glass (or at least stubby) half full sports fans. When an international swim meet is on, for example, the Americans could send in clones of Mark Spitz and we'd still back our team. When there's a rugby contest of any kind, the Kiwis don't stand a chance, even if their forwards are twice as big and the Haka reduces the bravest man to tears. And when it comes to World Cup football qualifiers, well, apparently we've always deserved a place.

I'm as happy as the next person that our Socceroos are in but what I can't take is the manner in which we constantly talk up our team.

The vibe around Sydney, prior to the Uruguay matches, was more optimistic than a Tom Cruise interview about his love life.

Not that there's anything wrong with that - there's a lot to be said for the kind of optimism that has people jumping up and down on couches. So often in life - and particularly in sport - it's optimism that gets us across the line. But there's also a fine line between optimism and parochialism.

Contrary to what many people believe, just because a nation hasn't been to the World Cup tournament in 32 years, it doesn't mean it's suddenly owed entry. Similarly, just because we have finally qualified, it doesn't mean we can now start talking about whom we're going to defeat.

For some reason - perhaps due to our overly successful international record in sports such as cricket, rugby, tennis and swimming - we seem to subscribe to a sort of Manifest Destiny, in which success is guaranteed in every game we play. This is why the winner of the first World Cup, Uruguay, one of the greatest football teams in history, was never a chance against the might of one-time qualifier Australia.

For those in the media who are obsessed with bloating our capabilities, here's a quick memo: we're not a world football power. When the US coach, Bruce Arena, recently said in a Sports Illustrated interview that he considered the Socceroos easy beats, why did everyone get up in arms about it?

Amongst the 32 best soccer nations in the world, many teams will consider us easy beats. There's nothing wrong with that because frankly, after thirty-two years of sub-par soccer that's shown little improvement, we should be grateful just to have qualified. 

Bring on the Yanks my backside cricket pitch. As one of the rising teams in football and boasting a ranking of Number-8 in the world, they could absolutely wallop us given the provocation. Yet the so-called 'experts' were once again trumpeting our prowess and calling for a match up against the US, over commonly-favoured rivals England. Since when are we a chance against England in World Cup anyway? We beat them once in a friendly, featuring their back-up unit in the second half.

Soccer commentator, Craig Foster, was amongst those contesting Arena. "He's got the right to voice his opinion, but it's laughable to suggest we rate that lowly," Foster told the Sydney Morning Herald in December. "He'll have to eat his words if we come up against the US. There's no issue we can beat them. We can beat any team on our day."

Any team on our day? That's kind of like saying if the wind is blowing the right way maybe Tim Henman can beat Roger Federer in a Grand Slam.

There is now of course a swelling optimism that the Socceroos can knock off at least one of the teams in our group, which features Brazil, Croatia and Japan.

Brazil is the tournament favourite as we all know and Japan and Croatia are no slouches. So perhaps we should just keep our mouths shut and simply enjoy it. What we need more than hot air is a little luck.