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MELBOURNE Joshua Kimmich Germany Jersey , Jan. 8 (Xinhua) -- As the host, the Australian team have bright prospects in front of their home fans in the opening game of Asian Cup meeting Kuwait here on Friday.


Although Australia suffered a three-game losing streak in 2014 World Cup, in Asia they still have advantages.


Australia's coach Ange Postecoglou recently named the 23-man squad with 16 players that featured in the 2014 World Cup finals, including the ever-dependable Tim Cahill and captain Mile Jedinak.


In the attacking line, veteran Cahill is always ready to score. Besides Cahill, Mark Bresciano Jonas Hector Germany Jersey , Robbie Kruse and Mathew Ryan are set to hit stride.


The average height of Australians' defense line is 1.85m and they are good at dealing with the ball in the air.


In comparison, most players of Kuwait are from their domestic leagues and there is a big gap between the two teams in terms of physiques, experience, team chemistry and personal ability.


""To be honest, the boys can't wait for Friday night. We've been on the road for 12 months and to walk out to a (predicted) sell-out crowd on Friday night, it's going to make the boys feel a couple of feet taller. I can't wait to get the match started Jerome Boateng Germany Jersey ,"" Coach Postecoglou said.


""Kuwait aren't scared of any team,"" Kuwait's midfielder Abdullah Al Buraiki declared. ""Kuwait respects all the teams that play against us. Australia are a very good team... we will do our best in the game to win.""


Australian culture is set to be an integral component at a highly anticipated opening ceremony on Friday.


Chart-topping Australian singer Havana Brown, pop band Sheppard and more than 200 junior footballers, dancers and professional performers will take to the field ahead of the tournament opener at Melbourne Rectangular Stadium.


The action-packed 11-minute opening ceremony will kick off a 23-day festival featuring 32 games between the top 16 football teams in Asia in a tournament with an expected television audience of 800 million.


Under the direction of Melbourne's Malaysian-born Chong Lim, the opening ceremony will showcase the best in Australian music, costume and dance Ilkay Gundogan Germany Jersey , celebrating the country's diverse lifestyle, backgrounds, tastes and passion for football.

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MELBOURNE, July 21 (Xinhua) -- A 66-year-old bottle of Australian wine has sold for more than 41,000 U.S. dollars in Melbourne, it was confirmed on Friday.


The bottle of 1951 Penfolds Grange Hermitage was auctioned off by MW Wines on Wednesday night with an unnamed collector taking the piece of history home for 41 Emre Can Germany Jersey ,110 U.S. dollars.


The vintage, Penfold's first, was produced by Max Schubert, the prestigious company's chief winemaker at the time, and was never made publicly available.


It is believed that around 1,800 bottles of the wine were produced Christoph Kramer Germany Jersey , 20 of which still exist today. It is the first sale of the 1951 wine since another bottle was sold for 39,870 U.S. dollars in 2004.


Nick Stamford, managing director of MW Wines, said it was a "staggering" price for "a piece of history."


He said that the wine had been tasted by Schubert in 1993 and Penfolds' current chief winemaker in 2012 who confirmed it was still in excellent condition.


"The 1951 is now quite notorious for many of them being not in great shape for drinking. Some are fantastic, but very variable. There is the old saying -- there is no great old wines, there is just great old bottles Bernd Leno Germany Jersey ," Stamford told Australian media on Friday.


"Some bottles still have fruit sweetness and flavor length. Largely the wine has a dull tawny color and skeletal palate structure with little flesh and fading tannins," he said.


"I would imagine this one's going to be part of history rather than being drunk. It's an investment," he added.


Penfolds is Australia's best-known winemaker with vintages regularly being sold for thousands of dollars despite some experts disputing that it's Australia's best wine.


"While it's an iconic style of wine, it's a style a lot of people, including myself, don't particularly enjoy Benedikt Howedes Germany Jersey ," Ian McKenzie, director of The Wine Society, said.


"There are and have been better wines than Grange but (Grange) has the cachet with the consumers and the collectors and that's why the price holds up."


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U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis hinted on Monday about the existence of military options on North Korea that might spare Seoul from a brutal counterattack but declined to say what kind of options he was talking about or whether they involved the use of lethal force.


U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said on Sunday the U.N. Security Council had run out of options on containing North Korea’s nuclear program and that the United States might have to turn the matter over to the Pentagon.


Any conflict on the Korean peninsula could easily result in a degree of bloodshed unseen since the 1950-53 Korean War, which claimed the lives of more than 50 Bastian Schweinsteiger Germany Jersey ,000 Americans and millions of Koreans and ended in an armed truce, not a peace treaty.


Seoul is within artillery range of North Korea, which beyond nuclear and conventional weapons is also believed to have a sizable chemical and biological arsenal.


Asked whether there were any military options the United States could take with North Korea that would not put Seoul at grave risk, Mattis said: “Yes there are. But I will not go into details.”


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